Principals Message

The Catherine McAuley Story

The OLM Mercy foundations trace their origins to Catherine McAuley, who established the first House of Mercy in Dublin in 1831. Her vision of education, care for the poor, and practical compassion shaped the missionary spirit that brought the Sisters to Australia and New Zealand.

Catherine McAuley was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1778. In 1824, she used her inheritance from an Irish couple she had served for twenty years to build a large House of Mercy, where she and other lay women would shelter homeless women, reach out to the sick and dying, and educate poor girls. The House on Baggot Street opened in 1827. To give these efforts greater stability, Catherine and her co-workers founded a new religious congregation. On 12 December 1831, she and two others professed their vows as the first Sisters of Mercy.

Before her death on 11 November 1841, Catherine founded convents and works of mercy throughout Ireland and England.

History

In 1935, the Sisters of Mercy (Parramatta congregation) established Our Lady of Mercy College (OLMC) in a cottage at 6 Coast Avenue, Cronulla and by 1943 was providing secondary education for girls, since there were no Catholic all girls secondary schools between Hurstville and Wollongong.

In 1959, with the existing cottage now too small, the Sisters of Mercy purchased the current property bounded by Dominic Street and Dolans Road at Burraneer Bay from Mr Charles Duncan.

In 2016, an eco-friendly and energy efficient building, the Catherine McAuley Centre, was designed to put pedagogy and relationships front and centre of learning at OLMC allowing students to engage in diverse and collaborative learning experiences.

Charism
Catherine McAuley founded the Congregation of the Sisters of Mercy in Dublin, Ireland in 1831. Adopting the title of Mercy for her institute, she recognised that this was God’s way of enabling her and the several women who had joined her, to continue their critical work among the poorest people of Dublin.

Catherine began her work in providing education for the young women in Dublin, a vision that led to the establishment of schools and hospitals in many countries of the world, including Australia, before the end of the 19th Century.

At Burraneer, we are part of the Mercy heritage stretching back to those days in Dublin. We are enriched by the Mercy values of Excellence, Hospitality, Justice, Stewardship, Service, Compassion and Dignity and continue to be guided by the legacy of the Mercy Sisters.