This is the best of times to be a Christian Brother. You might be saying Kevin needs help with his senior moments. How can I say that when ...

we are depleted in numbers, fewer brothers now than at any time in the past 50 yrs here in Victoria;

no new recruits and none in the foreseeable future other than in Africa;
many of the brothers are aged and frail and in aged care facilities;
no new brothers in 20 years. We have lost 2 generations;
we cannot speak the language of youth any more;
we have we lost our story;

if you are 50 in the brothers you are classed as a young brother.
 

Well why is it the best of times to be a Christian brother?

We could be likened to the chicken in the shell, perfectly comfortable in our shell, all our needs met internally so why break out. If we don’t we never meet the wonder of the world that is around us and we shrivel up in the shell and die. By gifting our schools to lay administration and the Edmund Rice Schools we are at last opening our schools to a wider vision and a sustainable future. Change is about the future not the past. This would never have happened unless we had competent lay people to advance our schools and widen their appeal and scope and continue the Edmund Rice spirit in education. So it is the best of times; instead of shrivelling up we find we are expanding in times when our own numbers are diminishing. This enables those brothers who can still make a difference to move into other areas, marginalised groups of young people needing assistance that is not provided for by the education system.

As a Christian Brother I deeply appreciate and value the work you are doing in the schools and I stand in awe of the development that has taken place and the depth of the education curriculum offered and the pastoral care that is so evident. This is why it is the best of times to be a Christian Brother.

Christian Brothers might be slow to change but we are very much about change. When I completed my term as principal of St. Joseph’s Pascoe Vale I made a farewell speech to the assembled principals stating I hoped to live long enough to see a woman in charge of a Christian Brother’s school. ... a cause of great glee and merriment among those assembled.
 

This happens next year, at St Joseph's Melbourne with the appointment of Maree Johnston.  I do hope it does not presage my own immediate demise as I now wish to see a few more women principals in our school’s.  Then I can go to the beyond smiling.

I also believe it is the best times for students to be in Christian Brothers' Schools. Our schools in the past were sometimes seen as recruitment grounds for Christian Brothers. We often set values that were ours alone. This is no longer an option. Youth now need role models who are parents, role models who are young and not too far removed from the youth culture of today:

teachers who can understand their music and even listen to it;

people who are familiar with the pressures of marriage, who can advise from their own experience the importance of careers, how to deal adequately with drugs, alcohol and peer pressure;

people of faith who are committed to Gospel values, the beauty of the environment we live in and the sanctity of all things living;

people of justice;

people who have to address problems at a school level that their own children have faced.

This gives them a far greater understanding and a very supportive approach than many brothers ever had. I am not saying there is no need for religious in the schools. There is, but their role these days is not one of authority but rather a supportive and encouraging role.

Today after 200 years Edmund Rice schools are able to continue and flourish due to the dedication and competency of an enlightened lay staff. I congratulate you on what you are doing and may Edmund Rice schools continue to thrive and prosper into the future and especially Parade College, St. Joseph’s Geelong and St. Virgil’s Hobart.

And as I hand over the symbolic batten I might remind you that the first followers of Edmund Rice in his first school were lay helpers and he also was a lay person.
 

Br Kevin Laws (SPA)