Year 9 Religious Education
The History of the Catholic Church in Australia
Choose a Catholic person or organisation from the list below. Use your person/organisation to tell the story of Australia and the Catholic Church. This information should be presented as a ten minute documentary created using iMovie and GarageBand.
1. Choose a person/organisation:
- Archbishop Bede Polding
- Archbishop Vaughan
- Cardinal Moran – Federation
- Archbishop Daniel Mannix – Conscription
- Knights of the Southern Cross
- Cold War – Communism – Bob Santamaria
- The Catholic Church and the Vietnamese community
- Aboriginal reconciliation – Pat Dodson or Betty Pyke
- Fr. John Therry
- Catholic Women’s League
- Centacare
- Sisters of Mercy
- St Vincent de Paul Society
- Sacred Heart Mission – Fr Ernie Smith
- Fr. Bob Maguire
- Caroline Chisholm
- Sisters of St. Joseph
- Sisters of Mercy
- Sisters of the Good Samaritan
- Marist Brothers
- Fr Frank Brennan
2. Consider the period of time in Australia’s history when this person/organisation carried out/started their work. Consider the needs of the community at this time:
- What social justice issues were there?
- How did the larger Australian community respond?
- How did the Catholic community respond?
In your documentary include the following:
- The historical background to the person/organisation. Information about them – born/begun, place, important moments, where now, pictures, timeline and any other relevant information.
- Mock interviews and re-enactments.
- How this person/group was important, influential and relevant in the Catholic Church and wider society.
- Describe other aspects of this time – for example Australian population, key social issues of the time in Australia, other world events at this time.
- Plan your documentary.
- Create your documentary.
- Show your documentary (10 minutes) to the class.
