In this installment of “Working in the Vineyard,” Pray Tell presents the Australian Catholic University Centre for Liturgy, in a conversation with Professor Clare Johnson, the director of the Centre.
How long has the Australian Catholic University Centre for Liturgy been around? Tell us about the founding vision and what your main work is.
The ACU Centre for Liturgy was founded in May 2015 as a Vice-Chancellorial priority project for the university under the auspices of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference which formally endorsed it in May 2016. Our scope is both ambitious in its continental coverage and grounded in the diverse needs of Australia and our near geographic neighbours. We were established to support, promote, and enhance the liturgical life of the Catholic Church through education, scholarship, and pastoral formation. Our formal cooperation with the ACBC means we have a national remit, and we deliver our offerings in person whenever possible and creatively in the virtual space otherwise. Our academic programs (undergraduate and postgraduate units and specialisations, and higher-degree research to PhD level) are offered through ACU’s Faculty of Theology and Philosophy where our academic staff are co-located. Our practical training is delivered through and certified by the Centre itself, and all our programs are grounded in sound, theologically centrist scholarship with a view to its application within the practical pastoral realities of our students and clients across the continent.
Who is your audience? Who reads your website and uses your materials?
A broad range of readers engage our materials which include our website, YouTube channel, Podcast ‘Speaking of Liturgy’, triannual Newsletter, Liturgy Nexus and Liturgy Nexus for Schools (which are fora for online conversation/resource-sharing). An extensive variety of people attend and participate in our online public lecture series and in-person formation programs (e.g., certification for funeral directors in celebrating Catholic funeral liturgies; professional learning in liturgy and sacraments for Catholic primary and secondary teachers; clergy formation in liturgical music, etc.), as well as in our online ministry training programs (for EMHC’s and Ministers of the Word). Our professional learning seminars attract a diversity of participants who can fulfil professional accreditation requirements in education and other areas (like healthcare) as they learn alongside ACU postgraduate students undertaking liturgy and sacramental theology units for academic credit.
While the typical age of those engaging with our materials and programs tends to skew toward middle- and mature-age, we have some regular participants in their twenties along with some upper-high-schoolers. Our audience consists of clergy, seminarians, religious, pastoral associates, teachers and religious educators, parishioners, musicians, architects, theology students, and other liturgy academics and professionals both domestic and international.
What is the most important contribution the Australian Catholic University Centre for Liturgy is making to the life of the church?
The ACU Centre for Liturgy is unique in terms of its formal relationship with the ACBC and its continental remit. While based in a university where its academics participate in all aspects of academic life and teach liturgy and sacraments at all levels, the Centre is also integrally linked to the bishops’ conference and works closely with them to foster liturgical best practice consistently and efficiently across Australia.
With the variety of archdioceses and dioceses in Australia we are called to be very flexible in both the mode and pitch of our program offerings, working with the clergy of Melbourne’s 200-plus-parish archdiocese one week, and the next travelling to remote Wilcannia-Forbes (a sparsely-populated rural diocese the size of Great Britain) to work with a small group of dedicated parishioners from far-flung tiny parish communities with scarce local liturgical resources.
Promoting a love and understanding of liturgy, and celebrating it properly, beautifully, and fruitfully among the diverse dioceses and communities of Australia is one of our many important contributions to the life of the Catholic Church. Consistency, current information, and informed explanations for why we do what we do as a Church and why how we do it is important when it comes to good liturgy, are all cornerstones of our approach to liturgical formation. Our small but dedicated team spread across three states, works very hard to advance the liturgical apostolate using whatever creative communication means we can while maintaining a solid grounding in pastoral best practice and cutting-edge research and scholarship in which we engage regularly.
Any new things in the works?
After receiving an inquiry from Africa in 2023, we recently offered our Ministers of the Word online pastoral training program to over 60 liturgical ministers (clergy and parishioners) from three parishes in Lagos, Nigeria who participated via asynchronous online modules and synchronous Zoom classes (taught live from Australia). We are hopeful that this rich experience was just the first of more international cohorts undertaking our online ministry training programs. We are in the early stages of developing another online training program relating to baptism and we are presently finalising a volume of essays on Sacrosanctum Concilium at 60+ which resulted from a wonderful scholarly symposium the Centre hosted at ACU in Melbourne in December 2023.
What else do you want Pray Tell readers to know about the Australian Catholic University Centre for Liturgy?
The work the ACU Centre for Liturgy does is a special form of evangelisation, often educating people who have practised their faith for their entire lives but have never had the opportunity to learn about liturgy and sacraments from subject specialists. We enjoy the challenge of intriguing those more recently engaged with the Church or those on the margins who may not previously have had the resources to recognise the depths of Christ’s presence in the liturgy. The Centre’s staff take seriously and value immensely the privilege of re-inspiring long-serving clergy and shaping those aspiring and newly ordained; as well as training the next generation of liturgical scholars, musicians, and formators and sharing the Gospel with a diversity of Catholics through a liturgical lens from within the heart of a Catholic university while working closely with our bishops. Leading the heart by engaging the mind and engaging the mind by touching the heart is a core aspiration which we seek to achieve through exposure to and education about the Church’s liturgical, musical, architectural, and artistic treasures.
The Centre aims to be financially self-sustaining, and we subsidise our work in areas where needs are high and resources are low via internal means but recognise that without the institutional support provided generously by ACU, the work of the Centre would not be possible. We also remain open to support from other avenues.
May God prosper your work!
This interview with Clare Johnson was conducted by email.