Sixteen Year 11 and 12 students from Coomera Anglican College joined Faith and Spirituality Coordinator, Mr Dom Fay, and Head of RaVE, Mrs Natasha Materne, on a journey to Alice Springs and Uluru in June 2023.

The Desert Retreat was an opt-in trip for students who felt a calling to deepen their sense of self and their spiritual lives.

Time was spent in guided reflections, encounters of awe and wonder in nature, and communal life shared together in the stunning surrounds of the Australian outback.

This is the story of the 2023 Desert Retreat in the students’ own words:

Upon arrival into Australia’s red centre, a short ten-minute drive from Alice Springs Airport brought us to Campfire in the Heart Retreat Centre. ‘Campfire’ is a beautiful space owned and operated by the World Community for Christian Meditation (WCCM), holding a main retreat house accompanied by a few smaller cabins on a breathtaking property backing onto the West MacDonnell ranges. 

Our time at Campfire involved sleeping in swags, sitting around fires, and walking on the red dirt, and we very quickly developed a deep sense of ‘groundedness’ and connection to country.

While in Alice Springs, Mr Fay led the group through a series of guided reflections on the ancient wisdom of the four-fold path. This wisdom comes out of our Anglican tradition’s understanding of life as an ever-evolving and ever-emerging thing, with each of us moving through seasons of change, suffering, joy and growth all throughout our lives…

Read the full story at www.anglicanschoolsaustralia.edu.au.