WelCom June/July 2023
Te Hīra o O’Shea 2023 – te mutunga mai o ngā Hapori Katorika
Sacred Heart College, Lower Hutt, and St Patrick’s College, Silverstream, are joint winners of this year’s O’Shea Shield competition.
The O’Shea Shield Speech and Drama Competition is an annual event, which sees young people from 17 Catholic secondary schools throughout Wellington archdiocese and Palmerston North diocese gather to compete in a variety of speech and drama events over two days.
Competitions are in eight categories: junior, senior, impromptu, and prepared speech, oratory; debating; religious questions; drama; and Scripture reading –Te Reo section and English section.
The host college arranges for appropriate adjudicators for each element of the competition.
This year, St Mary’s College in Wellington hosted the event after stepping in at short notice for Sacred Heart College Napier who was set to host the 2023 competition until the interruptions of Cyclone Gabrielle.
The 2024 competition will be co-hosted by Sacred Heart College in Napier and St Joseph’s Maori Girls’ College in the Hawke’s Bay.
Running since 1946, O’Shea Shield is one of New Zealand’s oldest intercollegiate competitions, and it involves around 300 students every year.
Sacred Heart College Napier was set to host the O’Shea Shield 2023, however, following Cyclone Gabrielle and the devasting floods impacting Hawke’s Bay in February, St Mary’s College Wellington at short notice offered to host the event instead. Kathy Ryan and her team stepped in to ensure the traditions of the debating competition were maintained and O’Shea Shield 2023 was held over the weekend of 6 and 7 May at St Mary’s College and supporting venues in Wellington.
Kathy Ryan, Coordinator, O’Shea Shield 2023
‘Community in Mission’ was this year’s O’Shea Shield theme. The mission? How to ensure the 75-year-old competition could continue in the face of disruptions and disaster. Like so many faith-based and other events, the O’Shea Shield has taken some knocks in recent years. After the competition was cancelled in 2020 and 2022 due to Covid-19, the 17 Catholic secondary schools in the Wellington and Palmerston North dioceses were looking forward to the return of the competition in Hawke’s Bay this year. And then Cyclone Gabrielle hit. With many families, schools and businesses severely affected, it quickly became obvious hosting and running the event was an impossibility for Sacred Heart College, Napier, even though they had already made a good start in planning and running the competition.
The Catholic community quickly came to the fore with St Mary’s College Tumuaki, Andrew Murray, offering to pick up hosting the competition at short notice, in the knowledge another year of cancellation may have made the competition difficult to continue in the future. Aided by Wellington’s St Patrick’s College and St Catherine’s College, St Mary’s took up the challenge and the O’Shea Shield competition was successfully held over the weekend of 6 and 7 May.
Around 270 talented young people gathered at St Mary’s on a wet Saturday morning, beginning with a pōwhiri and a warm and enthusiastic welcome from Kaumātua Jim Moriarty. Starting with the debating event, the students talked up a storm, the sun came out, and the competition began in earnest. Saturday’s events included the Debating, Junior Prepared Speech, Te Reo Māori Scripture Reading, Scripture Reading in English, and Oratory.
On Saturday evening the always popular Religious Drama event was held at St Patrick’s College in the magnificent O’Shea Performing Arts Centre, organised and run by St Patrick’s College. The students entertained the large crowd with five-minute interpretations of a range of biblical quotations. St Peter’s College, Palmerston North, won followed by St Patrick’s College, Wellington.
Religious Questions and Impromptu Speeches provided more entertainment on Sunday morning, along with games, including an oversized ‘Connect-4’ set up on the oval lawn outside Gabriel Hall at St Mary’s College. New friendships and camaraderie among the students were clearly apparent.
After the competitions had concluded on Sunday morning, everybody gathered for the Mass and prizegiving in St Paul’s Anglican Cathedral at the foot of Hill St, in the absence of the Catholic Cathedral’s availability. Archbishop Paul Martin sm celebrated Mass with Fr Matthew Crawford sm and Fr Ron Bennett. Co-hosted by St Mary’s College and St Catherine’s College, a joint music group led the singing.
‘Community in mission’ was seen throughout the weekend – being able to use St Paul’s Cathedral, spaces willingly provided at the Mercy Conference Centre and Sacred Heart Cathedral’s Connolly Hall for some competitions, St Catherine’s College providing accommodation for Chanel College, and as part of the Offertory, students providing non-perishable food for St Vincent de Paul. Running the O’Shea Shield competition was truly a community effort.
Next year, the O’Shea Shield will be co-hosted in Hawke’s Bay by Sacred Heart College, Napier, and St Joseph’s Māori Girls’ College. Everyone is looking forward to making the trip to Napier and supporting the people in the Hawke’s Bay community.
O’Shea Shield 2023 was jointly won overall by Sacred Heart College, Lower Hutt, and St Patrick’s College, Silverstream, closely followed by St Mary’s College, Wellington.
O’Shea Shield 2023 results
| St Catherine’s Cup for Best Negative Debating Team | Conor Chesney, Michael Cash, Leo Moss – St Patrick’s College, Wellington. |
| St Mary’s Cup for Best Affirmative Debating Team | Emily Ung, Isabella Cash, Hannah Sema – St Mary’s College, Wellington. |
| Te Kaipānui i te Kupu Cup for Scripture Reading in Te Reo Māori – Section A | Hana Burkitt – St Catherine’s College, Wellington; and Te Aiokura Kenrick Paniora – St Peter’s College, Palmerston North. |
| Te Kaipānui i te Kupu Cup for Scripture Reading in Te Reo Māori – Section B | Toko Turipa – St John’s College, Hastings. |
| George Family Cup for Junior Prepared Speech – Section A | Te Akau Scott – St Joseph’s Māori Girls’ College, Napier. |
| Vaughan Family Cup for Junior Prepared Speech – Section B | Rohan Botha – St Bernard’s College, Lower Hutt. |
| Cardinal McKeefry Cup for Oratory – Section A | Celestine Kaio – St Mary’s College, Wellington. |
| Bishop Cullinane Cup for Oratory – Section B | Maui Winitana-Patelesio – St Patrick’s College, Silverstream. |
| Catherine McAuley Cup for Scripture Reading –Section A | Aaron Moe – St Patrick’s College, Wellington; and Bella Penman – Sacred Heart College, Lower Hutt. |
| St Peter Chanel Cup for Scripture Reading –Section B | Jayden Mathers – St John’s College, Hastings; and Irina Vlasov, St Joseph’s Māori Girls’ College, Napier. |
| Bishop Owen Snedden Cup for Drama – 1st place | Aria Lyons, Ivy Cao, Elise d’Arbois Jubainville, Joshua Leamy-King, Denz Shinoy – St Peter’s College, Palmerston North. |
| The Society of Mary Cup for Drama – 2nd place | Noah Jefferson, Joseph Asfaw, Conor Chesney, Oliver Tull, Constantine Saunoa-Tasele – St Patrick’s College, Wellington. |
| Sacred Heart Lower Hutt Jubilee Cup for Impromptu Speaking – Section A | Jonathan Bentley-Cribb – St Patrick’s College, Silverstream. |
| Silverstream Cup for Impromptu Speaking –Section B | Lewis Collins – St Bernard’s College, Lower Hutt. |
| Hibernian Cup for Religious Questions – Section A | Angelei Canete, Michaela Borja, Bianca Blanch – St Catherine’s College, Wellington. |
| The Mercy Cup for Religious Questions – Section B | Jacob Werahia-Praat, Noah Greaney, Michael Brophy – St Patrick’s College, Silverstream. |
| Jubilee Plaque – 2024 co-hosting | Sacred Heart College, Napier and St Joseph’s Māori Girls’ College – Napier. |
| Bishop Viard Memorial Trophy – Runners-up 2023 | St Mary’s College, Wellington. |
| O’Shea Shield – Joint Winners 2023 | Sacred Heart College, Lower Hutt and St Patrick’s College, Silverstream. |