Winter Magic Festival, Katoomba

The Winter Magic Festival is a free annual event, celebrated around the shortest day of the year in Katoomba, Blue Mountains of NSW, Australia.

The shortest day this year falls on 22 June. However, the festival will take place on the 20th of June. The Blue Mountains is NSW’s inaugural City of Arts and Katoomba is the heart of that city. It is the weekend when artists, musicians, dancers, drummers, choirs, stalls and the community take over one of Australia’s most famous towns. During this event the main street of Katoomba is closed to motor traffic and open to pedestrian traffic. This allows the whole town to become a performance space. The streets are lined with market stalls and everybody who attends is encouraged to dress in costume. This event attracts thousands of people. However, the general atmosphere is that of a pagan one

This is our opportunity to bear witness to Jesus in a secular environment in partnership with St Mary MacKillop Parish, Katoomba.

We will walk through the streets of Katoomba during the festival chatting with people and handing out brochures inviting them for hot sausage sizzle, bacon & egg rolls Very good prices. (Flyers will be available at St Canice’s

We will also be available around the barbecue and with the music ministry as well as on the street at the entrance of the driveway to invite and relate to people.

Healing Prayer Room (Free)

Also we will invite them to the Healing Prayer Room at the Catholic Church where they can receive prayers for physical, emotional and spiritual healing. They don’t have to be Catholic or even Christian. If they need healing we will pray with them.

This is an invitational job for cheerful and prayerful followers of Christ so that the general public experiences the joy of following Christ through us.

This is an opportunity for us to practice what we learned in: Walking Across the Room (WATR).

When we step out of our comfort zone to the ‘zone of the unknown’ (ZOTU).

“Hi, my name is …. , I would like to invite you to ….”

This is something every one of us can do.

1. Excuse yourself from a ‘circle of comfort’ (COC) you are in.
2. Look across whatever room / car park / shopping centre / hall you are in, use your eyes, ears, how to discern if there is someone across the room you should be paying attention to.
3. Make the turn to take the first step towards ‘walking across the room’ to the zone of the unknown.
4. Pray as you take the first step.
5. Talk normally with people who need a normal Christian to talk with. Don’t be an E rupter.
   Don’t be an avoider.
6. Recognise windows of opportunity where you can steer the conversation towards things of God.
7. Describe what your Christian experience is without sounding churchy.
8. Offer to take contact details from people who wish to receive further information.
9. The Challenge is: Love the person, families and children. .All welcome.

Practical Stuff

• Warm colourful clothes. Forecast for Saturday is partly cloudy, temperature from 2 to 12 degrees C.
• Trains departing Springwood: 8:44am, will arrive at Katoomba 9:27am.
• Walk 1 km 10 minutes to the Church.
• Mass 9:30. Fr Ted said he will wait a few minutes so if you hurry there you will make it.

Let us call on the Holy Spirit to fill us with zeal for the salvation of souls.

Saint John Chrysostom, Doctor of the Church:
“Zeal for the salvation of souls is of so great a merit before God that to give up all our goods to the poor or to spend our whole life in the exercises of all sorts of austerities cannot equal the merit of it. There is NO service more agreeable to God than this one. To employ life in this blessed labour is more pleasing to the Divine Majesty than to suffer martyrdom.”

Let us heed the advice of St Peter:
“Beloved: Sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts. Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope, but do it with gentleness and reverence, keeping your conscience clear, so that when you are maligned, those who defame your good conduct in Christ may themselves be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that be the will of God, than for doing evil. For Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the sake of the unrighteous, that he might lead you to God. Put to death in the flesh, he was brought to life in the Spirit.” 1 Peter 3:15-18

Let us prepare spiritually and respond to the Lord’s invitation: “If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.” 2 Chron 7:14

“Holy Spirit, help me to repent of my sins and grow in holiness so that I will be a better witness of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus.”