Maureen Postma

As general secretary of the Victorian Council of Churches since March 2001, her daily working life is dedicated to bringing people together for the betterment of the community. But it is her personal commitment to these aims that makes her work exceptional.

A committed Christian, Maureen says her strength comes from her faith, and her inspiration from the people, often those suffering hardship, whom she meets in her role. Maureen is a strong advocate for church and agency cooperation. She is also a member of the Premier's Multifaith Leaders' Forum, which provides strategic advice to the Premier on multifaith and community harmony issues. The Victorian Council of Churches membership includes representatives from the Anglican, Catholic, Lutheran, Uniting and Orthodox faiths from across Victoria and Tasmania.

"We are continually working on ways of bringing people of faith together," she said. "There has been a strong commitment by the churches to work together in the past and really I am continually strengthening the good work that has been done in the past 50 to 100 years."

Maureen promotes a variety of activities and committees to enable churches to work together and reaches out to women of all faiths to establish frameworks, build understanding and promote community harmony and respect for all women. She said the biggest challenge the council, and indeed the community, would face in the future was overcoming divisions in the community and dealing with the continuing impact of drought and bushfires. "They are adding another layer of complexity to the issues people are already facing," Maureen said. "But I would hope that we, as people of faith, can do whatever we can to help people face these issues."