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Cardinal Pell blesses Tenison Woods House
His Eminence George Cardinal Pell DD AC and the Honourable Joe Hockey MP blessed and opened ACU's newest acquisition in North Sydney recently.
Professor Greg Craven, Mr Michael Daley, General Peter Cosgrove, His Eminence George Cardinal Pell DD AC and Mr Joe Hockey.
Mr Hockey said he had been great beneficiary of Catholic education, as had his family.
“Australian Catholic University is a wonderful institution and I’m honoured to be here today… my nephew graduates from this University in a few months having just secured a graduate position at KPMG – and he is the first in his family to attend university. This illustrates the opportunities… that you provide to people who may not have previously ever had an opportunity.”
“This University is a proud part of the North Sydney landscape, it adds so much to my electorate… students here represent an opportunity to provide growth in the community… and energy in the community.”
The building at 8–20 Napier Street has been renamed Tenison Woods House in honour of Father Julian Edmund Tenison Woods. Together with Blessed Mary MacKillop, he founded the Sisters of St Joseph of the Sacred Heart in 1866. The Sisters of St Joseph are one of the founding congregations of ACU and an important part of its history.
Vice-Chancellor Professor Greg Craven welcomed members of the Tenison Woods family, and said ACU was now the largest English-speaking Catholic university in the world.
“This building gives us a unique opportunity to recognise one of the greatest figures in the history of the Australian Catholic Church and indeed in Australia itself– Father Julian Tenison Woods… a great priest and a great scholar.
“The range of Tenison Woods’ academic work is such that he would, were he alive today, walk into a chair at any university in Australia. He wrote multiple books, hundreds of scholarly articles, was a member of numerous royal societies, and his range of scholarly activity covered everything from biology to geology to history to geography... and he had a particular interest in Indigenous people.”
The University purchased the tower building last year to support its growth plan and expansion of the North Sydney Campus and course offerings.
The 22-storey building will allow for an increase in student numbers to be accommodated by 2016, and will help provide the library and learning space for new courses in Allied Health, Law, Global Studies and Business.
