Associated with St. Mary’s Funeral Ministry, the Bereavement Group is a dedicated group of people who contact recently bereaved parishioners and offer companionship during their grieving journey. We commenced in 2001 and have had training suitable to our role, but we are not grief counsellors or social welfare workers. We make contact, either by phone or personal encounter, and mail cards both at the time of loss and upon its first anniversary. Only people with Police Checks visit people in their homes. For funerals held at St. Mary’s, we supply a small wooden cross as a memorial of the loved one, and it is kept on the Remembrance Banner at the back of the church for the current year.

All grieving people are invited to attend a monthly Memorial Mass, held on the last Friday of each month (February to November), and share a cuppa afterwards in the Gathering Space. Once a year, on the last Friday in November, we plan a Remembrance Mass to which all people who have lost a family member during the year, are invited. The Memorial Garden on the Grimshaw Street side of the church is also administered by our group. We meet on a monthly basis to pray together, organise phone calls and sending of cards, plan our monthly Memorial Mass or annual Remembrance Mass, and share our experiences with the bereaved in a confidential and supportive manner. We are always looking for compassionate people to join our group, so if you are interested please contact the Parish Office.