St Andrew’s has a very active Anglican Mothers’ Union Australia (AMUA) branch, with new members joining regularly. Everyone is welcome to join. For more information, contact Helen Zappala on 0400 951 945.
Meetings
On the second Friday of each month, we gather for a short Eucharist or Morning Prayer at 9:30 am. We then have morning tea before our meeting at about 10:00 am. Most months, we have a guest speaker choosing from a huge variety of subjects that interest our group. Non-members are welcome to attend when a guest speaker is addressing the meeting.
Events and Guest Speakers in 2025
- 14 February: Administrative matters and planning for the year.
- 14 March: Marjory Fieldus will speak about lone members in the Diocese.
- 28 March: We hold a Diocesan Retiring Collection at the morning services for expanding parenting literacy in the Solomon Islands.
- 11 April: MU quiz. Members bringing their favourite prayer to read to the group. Discussion on the new MU symbol.
- 9 May: Senior Sergeant Phillips will speak about elder abuse. The Diocesan President will present 3 60-year long service awards, 1 50-year award, 1 40-year certificate and 2 10-year certificates at the Eucharist prior to the meeting.
- 13 June: Robyn Murray will speak about healthy ageing.
- 11 July: There will be activities organised by a member. TBA.
- 8 August: Lunch at Hunter and Scout. We will have a Mary Sumner quiz. Mary Sumner began Mothers’ Union in England in 1876. MU came to Australia in the early 1900s.
- 10 August: We hold a retiring collection for Anglicare Southern Qld Rapid Response Project at the morning services.
- 12 September: A guest will speak about “Hope in a Suitcase” – an organisation which helps children in need.
- 10 October: The AGM and ordinary meeting.
- 14 November: Our Christmas break up lunch at Forages Café at Taringa Fiveways. Deliver items donated by members to Zephyr Education.
Activities
Indooroopilly branch organises the Simnel Cake for the parish on Mothering Sunday.
Towards the end of March there is a Lady Day service at the Cathedral on a Wednesday close to the Annunciation. Branches from all over the diocese attend and there is a long, spectacular procession of banners from each branch attending.
Our branch donates items needed to Zephyr Education, which supports children of domestic violence situations, and we are looking to support Hope in a Suitcase which aids children in need.
Some members knit beanies, scarves and mittens for the Mission to Seafarers.
We have an annual social outing for lunch in the winter months.
Our branch purchases the palm crosses for the parish every year for use on Palm Sunday.
We give Baptismal cards and teddies to those young and mature people getting baptised and we visit our sick and hospitalised members.
We usually have one Deanery Day a year when the six branches of the North West Deanery get together. This is also a time to present badges and scrolls for years of service to Mothers’ Union.
There are two Diocesan Council meetings held each year at St John’s Cathedral, one in February the other in November. Plus there are two Country Council meetings held in towns outside the diocese in May and August. In 2025 they are in Toowoomba and Bundaberg.
Our meetings are lots of fun when we do quizzes or have a games morning.
The Poinsettia Post is produced each season of the year to keep us up to date on other branches in the Brisbane Diocese. Australia-wide the Mia Mia magazine is also produced four times per year with information on all branches around the country.
Annual Appeals
Each year on Mothering Sunday (the 4th Sunday in Lent – 3 weeks before Easter), we join with other MU branches in the Brisbane Diocese to raise funds for an Overseas and Northern Outreach project selected by Sumner House in London.
On the Sunday closest to Mary Sumner Day (9 August), the AMUA Brisbane diocesan branches hold another appeal to raise funds for Anglicare’s Rapid Response for children.
Anglican Mothers’ Union Australia
From helping people to read in Ethiopia to knitting tiny garments for premature babies: from running parenting programs to providing home-maker parcels to refugees; from supporting parish Family Workers to running family-related seminars in the community – these are just a few of the many projects of AMUA. For more information, see https://www.muaustralia.org.au/.
Mothers’ Union Worldwide
The Mothers’ Union is an international Christian charity that seeks to support families worldwide. Its members are not all mothers or even all women, as there are many parents, men, widows, singles and grandparents involved in its work. Its main aim is to support monogamous marriage and family life, especially through times of adversity. Globally, Mothers’ Union has over 4,000.000 members in 84 countries. For more information, see https://www.mothersunion.org/.
The Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby once said:
The Mothers’ Union in so many places is an organisation that listens to the voices of weeping. Whether it’s in Burundi, the Congo or South Sudan; whether it’s in homes in cities where when the local football team loses there is a 50 percent increase in domestic violence; whether it is in the loneliness of weeping by people who are not suffering physically but are spiritually empty and lost; it is the Mothers’ Union that exists in the vision of Mary Sumner to speak of those things that God has provided that bring hope, help and a future”…[Mothers’ Union is] an extraordinary movement to support the family… But there is also such a need for global women’s groups. And you are among the most embedded, the most effective, the most widespread. There are few that can rival you – if any.
Reflecting on United Nations research showing that no major civil conflict since 1945 has ended without the involvement of women’s groups, the Archbishop said the Mothers’ Union holds in its hands two aspects of:
…the most extraordinary treasure that God has brought together. You are one of the greatest of women’s groups in the world, and you have the treasure of the gospel of reconciliation. What more could be needed to be transforming of the world in which we live? …Nine-tenths of your work is hidden in the parishes and the dioceses, in the hills and the villages – doing the work of bringing hope and strengthening families, of supporting churches, of transforming communities.