We share a vision of leadership that is impelled by the parable of the Good Samaritan, guided by the Rule of Benedict and inspired by the Sisters of the Good Samaritan.

Our spirituality and tradition call for leaders who: 

• recognise that, at its heart, leadership is a call to serve.

• understand that the purpose of leadership is to build up love to strengthen the community.

• value the gifts of others, recognising diversity as fundamental to the wondrous mystery of God’s creation.

• model a love of learning and a commitment to the sacred patchwork of personal and spiritual growth.

• reach out and meet God here, where God is, building a community that is an “oasis of God’s presence and place of possibility” 1.

• listen deeply with a commitment to integrity and transparency, understanding the centrality of listening for authentic dialogue and discernment.

• are relational and respectful, seeking to include all voices in the process of dialogue

• learn from the wisdom of others.

• persevere and demonstrate stability when facing setbacks and difficulties in life.

• live simply and are content.

• accept the mystery of God’s ways, acknowledging that not everything can be known or knowable

• take themselves lightly, seeing with fresh eyes and taking a gracious perspective.

• practise gentleness and serenity.

• exercise authority and leadership that is open, collaborative and continually developing.

The Rule of Benedict provides us with a “reconciled understanding of leadership” that encourages our leaders to “hold in harmony all the tensions, the paradoxes, that living our faith implies, working together towards reconciliation . . . of the ambiguities that life, in its fullness, brings to us”2.

1. Catherine Eagan, What do Benedictines Have to offer Australia Today? Address at the ABU Study Day

2. Carmel Posa, Standing before God in the Whirlwind: Reconciliation of Paradoxes and the Rule of Benedict. Tjurunga: An Australian Benedictine Review, No 96, 2021 29-43, p43