Ltyentye Apurte, also known as Santa Teresa, is a community in the

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (abbreviated as NT; known formally as the Northern Territory of Australia and informally as the Territory) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian internal territory in the central and central-northern regi ...

, Australia, many residents of the locality are members of the

Arrernte Arrernte (also spelt Aranda, etc.) is a descriptor related to a group of Aboriginal Australian peoples from Central Australia. It may refer to: * Arrernte (area), land controlled by the Arrernte Council (?) * Arrernte people, Aboriginal Australi ...

indigenous Indigenous may refer to: *Indigenous peoples *Indigenous (ecology) In biogeography, a native species is indigenous to a given region or ecosystem if its presence in that region is the result of only local natural evolution (though often populari ...

community, whose origins are located about south-east of

Alice Springs Alice Springs () is a town in the Northern Territory, Australia; it is the third-largest settlement after Darwin, Northern Territory, Darwin and Palmerston, Northern Territory, Palmerston. The name Alice Springs was given by surveyor William ...

History

The mission run by the

Missionaries of the Sacred Heart The Missionaries of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (MSC; ; ) are a missionary congregation in the Catholic Church. It was founded in 1854 by Jules Chevalier at Issoudun, France, in the Diocese of Bourges. The motto of the Missionaries of the S ...

at Arltunga was moved to Santa Teresa in 1953. It included a Mission school and dormitories which accommodated Aboriginal children aged 5 to 17 years. Hospital care was provided. Father Thomas Dixon was responsible for the church. In 1976, administration was passed from the Mission to an Aboriginal land trust and the community was renamed Ltyentye Apurte. Although the residential section of the Mission school was closed in the same year, the day school remains operational and in the hands of the church. The Keringke Arts Centre was established in 1989. Since 2007 women in the community have painted religious crosses which are exported to Catholic churches around the world. In 1996, the population was recorded at 458, rising to 932 in 2011 and to 684 in 2016 and 708 in 2021. According to data from the 2011 census, Santa Teresa is the most

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

place in Australia. On November 1, 2023, a landmark legal case was won in the High Court by two public housing tenants in Santa Teresa. The court ruled that NT Housing was liable for any emotional distress caused due to a failure to maintain the houses, and as such the tenants can sue for damages.

Governance

The community is governed by a Community Government Council which runs the health service (with dialysis room) and some other facilities. The community contains
Catholic primary/senior school
police station, airstrip and Catholic Church. Since 1 July 2008, the MacDonnell Shire is the responsible

local government Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of governance or public administration within a particular sovereign state. Local governments typically constitute a subdivision of a higher-level political or administrative unit, such a ...

for the area.

Sport

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an Australian rules football playing field, oval field, often a modified ...

is popular there, with matches played at the Santa Teresa Local Stadium which was resurfaced from sand loam to grass in 2021 through a project in partnership with the AFL's

Melbourne Football Club The Melbourne Football Club, nicknamed the Demons or colloquially the Dees, is a professional Australian rules football club based in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It competes in the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's premier comp ...

Red and Blue Foundation.

Awards

In 2019, Ltyentye Apurte won the

Australian Tidy Town Awards The Australian Sustainable Communities Tidy Town Awards were launched in 1968 in Western Australia and are an initiative of Keep Australia Beautiful. These awards encourage, motivate and celebrate the achievements of rural and regional communiti ...

competition and is named ''Australian most sustainable Community''.

References

External links

Macdonnell Shire - Ltyentye ApurteCommunity profile - Santa Teresa
(2009)

{{Localities and communities of the MacDonnell Region, state=collapsed Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory Former local government areas of the Northern Territory Australian Aboriginal missions Arrernte MacDonnell Region Catholic Church in the Northern Territory