This week we celebrated our Founders Day. On February 2, 1804, Julie Billiart, Françoise Blin de Bourdon and Catherine Duchatel consecrated themselves to God and promised to educate poor children and to form teachers. As the 2nd February was already the Feast of the Purification of Mary and the Presentation of Jesus (Candlemass), they decided to name themselves the Sisters of Notre Dame and after moving from France to Namur in Belgium, they became the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur.
In Belgium, Julie established schools for poor children and she saw education for everyone as a basic human right and teaching as the ‘greatest work on earth’.
The Sisters came to Leeds in 1898 at the invitation of Canon Croskell to run the schools in the Cathedral Parish. Notre Dame High School for Girls was opened in 1904-5 and became a Sixth Form College in 1989.
Lay Chaplain, Anne Merry, said ‘Notre Dame Day allows us to look back at and give thanks for the great foundation that the College was built upon. From the Sisters arriving here with a mission to provide education to all, Notre Dame Catholic Sixth Form College continues to afford opportunities to all students so that they experience education of the whole person and are enabled to reach their potential’.
Students and Staff celebrated Notre Dame Day by enjoying free porridge in the canteen, taking part in the Notre Dame Day Challenge and through the celebration of Mass at lunchtime. Fr John Carlisle reminded us that just as Simeon and Anna recognised Jesus as the Messiah and the light of the world, we too can share the light in our communities and learn from the example of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur around the world.
As part of our Notre Dame Day celebrations, Lower Sixth students have been learning about the life and legacy of Sr Dorothy Stang, a Notre Dame sister who dedicated her life to helping the poor farmers in the Amazon, and working to protect them and the forest. She was murdered in 2005. Students were given the choice of writing to Baroness Chapman, Minister for International Development, asking her to refocus UK aid spending on agroecology, the kind of sustainable approach to farming pioneered by Sr Dorothy Stang. They could also choose to give a creative response to her story, and one student, Audrey Ng, drew this image. She said: 'I think the most touching part of this story is that Dorothy Stang stayed faithful to her beliefs until the end. Because of this, I used a black figure against the bright Amazon rainforest to show the tragedy of her death and the life of nature. I think the rainforest is similar to the Garden of Eden in the Bible, and the snake and apple come from that story, showing how temptation and greed can lead people to destroy both nature and others'.
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