Katharine Massam

Portrait: 

Dr Katharine Massam BA (Hons), DipEd, PhD, ASDA

Professor of Church History

Teaching in the United Faculty of Theology

Memory, History and the Historians

Secular and Sacred in Australia

Reformation History

History of Christian Spirituality

Living by the Rule: Benedictine Spirituality in Australia

Research Areas:

Australian history, Christian spirituality.

Other Responsibilities

Chair, Research Committee of the Centre for Theology and Ministry

Member, Council of the United Faculty of Theology

Recent and Forthcoming Presentations

• ‘Australian Spirituality: Centre and Periphery’, Public lecture, Carmelite Library Series, Melbourne, March 2009.
•  ‘Identity and the Australian Church’, Keynote Address, Mission and Evangelism Network, Melbourne, April 2009.
• Interview for Challenge, Change, Faith: Catholic Australia and the Second Vatican Council, DVD. www.challengechangefaith.com
•  ‘Space, Place, and the Sacred’,  4 sessions, School of Ministry, UCA Presbytery of Tasmania, May 2009.
• ‘Bethany: Contemplative Stream’. 3 sessions, Ministers’ Retreat, UCA Presbytery of Port Phillip East, September 2009.
•  ‘Who’s Afraid of Postmodernism?’ Scholar on the Road Series, CTM, September 2009.
• ‘Easter in the public realm: social justice and the liturgical movement in Australia’, Australian Catholic Historical Society, Sydney, September 2010.
•  ‘Three Monastic Women: Insights for Ministry’, UCA Women in Ministry Retreat, October 2009.
• Macrina, Gertrude and Thérèse: Lifestories of Prayer, Work and Community’, CEO Melbourne Leadership Seminar, October 2009. 
• Mission Histories and Context, Seminar, Benedictine Community of New Norcia, April 2010
• Peter Cross Memorial Lecture, Gardenvale Ecumenical Churches, May 2010.

Research Projects and Interests

i) Benedictine Missionary Women in Australia

This project is the main focus in the first half of 2010.  I am completing a book on the Spanish women who lived and worked at the Benedictine Mission at New Norcia in Western Australia from 1904-1974.  This project draws on a range of documentary, oral, material and photographic sources to explore stories of the missionary women and the Aboriginal children in their care.

ii) Prayer and Work

iii) Liturgy and social action

Selected Publications

‘That there was love in this home’: the Benedictine Missionary Sisters at New Norcia’ in Evangelists of Empire? Missionaries in Colonial History ed. Amanda Barry, Joanna Cruickshank, Andrew Brown-May and Patricia Grimshaw, Melbourne, University of Melbourne eScholarship Research Centre, 2008. Online: http://msp.esrc.unimelb.edu.au/shs/missions

‘Ethics and Theology in the Public Square: the Australian Network of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines’ in Patricia Pak Poy (ed.) A Path is Made by Walking, Melbourne: John Garrett, 2006.

‘The Christian Churches in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific’ in Hugh McLeod (ed.) The Cambridge History of Christianity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.

On High Ground: images of one hundred years, Crawley, University of Western Australia Press, 1999.

Sacred Threads: Catholic Spirituality in Australia 1922-1962, Kensington, University of New South Wales Pess, 1996.