M V Tronson, formerly the Australian Cricket Team chaplain, recalls that it took two years of preparation. He met with the then Victorian Cricket Team chaplain, the Reverend Barrie Sutton, and the Australian Cricket Board; then with the Australian Cricketers Association in 1998, and finally Life After Cricket was given support and encouragement, and came into being in 2000.
"Cricket had the chaplaincy program for their players," M V Tronson explained. "We sought to continue in this direction for retired cricketers and their families."
To establish the Retired Australian Cricketers Bi-Annual Newsletter, to be published at the start and finish of each cricket season, he sought from each State an editorial team member: Allan Border (Qld); Phil Emery (NSW); Jason Bakker and Shaun Graf (VIC); David Boon (TAS); Greg Chappell (SA), and Kim Hughes (WA). All these retired cricketers continue to lend their proficient support to this newsletter.
Each November, the issue seems to focus on items associated with the development of cricket; whereas each March issue has more news items such as mentioning those inaugurated into the Cricket Hall of Fame and those given Australia Day Honours; discussing Coaching changes and such other events that members have been involved in.
Mark Tronson serves as the collator of the information and writes a Chaplain's Chat in each issue. On the 9th of each of the two publishing months, he sends a draft copy to each member of the Editorial Team. There have often been additions sent for the final copy.
Two interesting snippets of information in this current issue are data extracts from The Australian newspaper. One cited Matthew Hayden's ideas for the future of Cricket while the second, that when Adolph Hitler played cricket when recuperating from injury at the end of WWI (there were British POWs nearby) he gave the game an insightful motto: (Ohne Hast, ohne Rast) - 'Unhasting, Unresting'.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/adolf-hitler-played-cricket-and-tried-to-change-the-rules-john-simpson-book-reveals/story-e6frg6so-1225842369506
In this March 30th issue the Chaplain's Chat focuses on the word 'converging' and how this past cricket season has seen the various shapes of the game converge on each other – Twenty/20, One Day and Test Cricket.
In like manner Mark Tronson described the remarkable converging when Jesus came to earth in 1st Century – there was world peace, a one world language, travel was frequent within the trades routes. As the Jewish religion was licensed, the Gospel was taken first into the synagogues throughout the breadth and depth of the Roman Empire. There was no other time in history when all these events came together.