The Augustinians have celebrated 50 years since their arrival in South Yarra, Melbourne, an event commemorated last month with an anniversary Mass at St Joseph’s parish, presided by Melbourne Archbishop Peter A. Comensoli and attended by priests of the Order, reports Melbourne Catholic.

The Augustinians arrived in South Yarra in February, 1976 and celebrated their 50th anniversary in the parish on Sunday, March 22 this year.

*Fr Tony Banks OSA gives his homily at the 50th anniversary Mass at South Yarra (PHOTO: Melbourne Catholic)*

Fr Tony Banks OSA gave the homily at the anniversary Mass, an entertaining account of the parish’s history since 1976, interwoven with insights from the day’s gospel, the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead in John 11.

Fr Tony, who was a young member of the parish welcoming committee at the time of the Augustinians’ arrival (before he became an Augustinian himself), remembers the day they showed up. The first to walk in was a solemn Maltese priest, very clerical, then a “wild-eyed” Irishman “full of life and energy and vitality, but definitely needed some grooming,” he joked.

Finally, there was Ray Mitchell, a blond-haired Australian wearing a slightly grubby white T-shirt. “I knew he couldn’t possibly be the parish priest, but he was,” Fr Tony said to laughter from everyone present—including Fr Ray himself, one of the concelebrants. “So already, even in my mind, the parish had been turned a little bit upside down.”

“Ten years after the [Second Vatican] Council, all of the structures that the council had called for were in place. But when a religious group moves in, it was a change of pace,” he said.

The Augustinians did things a little differently. The presbytery became a priory. More importantly, they threw its doors open. They had a great cook, Fr Tony said, and soon they were hosting Sunday lunches for anyone in the parish who wanted to come.

“When you throw open the house, people will get [the idea that] this is what it’s like,” he said, referring to the community life of the Augustinians. “And when you throw open the structures within the running of the church … that’s called vulnerability. Today’s Gospel talks about vulnerability, Jesus’ vulnerability, and that wonderful little, simple phrase, ‘Jesus wept’.”

This sense of openness has defined the Augustinians’ 50 years in the parish of South Yarra, which includes St Joseph’s and St Thomas Aquinas’ churches.

“From vulnerability, we move,” Fr Tony said. “We move towards the building of community. The Augustinians brought many gifts, but what they brought was quite something. We hear the readings today of Ezekiel [37], of breathing life into the old bones, [and] that notion that we are here to build. That whole sense of community became paramount.”

Over the decades, that spirit translated into real action in the parish, Fr Tony said.

“Today, when we look around, we see a parish revitalised by the different immigrants, particularly from Asia. We see new life in the leadership of the parish, which comes from that group. We see a parish which has strived … to be inclusive, to reach out,” he said.

“You deserve congratulations as much as the Augustinians here building community, wanting to see the body of Christ come fully alive, as Jesus did for Lazarus.”

This article is an abbreviated version of an article published in Melbourne Catholic.