The Catholic Leader Keeping Faith with You

PRO-lifer Graham Preston, a regular campaigner outside Brisbane’s abortion clinics, knows his days of freedom to do that are numbered. Queensland’s Termination of Pregnancy Bill – effectively legalising abortion – comes into force on December 3, and 63-year-old Mr Preston faces arrest if he continues his activism. New laws will establish 150m exclusion or “bubble zones” around abortion clinics or medical ... Read More »

A QUEENSLAND bishop has demanded it was time to bring home the remaining Bali Nine, convicted after smuggling drugs in 2005 and still languishing behind bars in Indonesia. “Surely our government and the Indonesian government could get together and talk about the possibility of getting those Australians home,” Townsville Bishop Tim Harris, who has a deep pastoral connection with the ... Read More »

  In a country where water is key to security and survival, Israeli authorities are rallying to save the shrinking Sea of Galilee that has reached its lowest level in a century CHRISTIAN pilgrims flock to the shores of the holy Sea of Galilee to visit the sites where Jesus performed healing miracles and walked on water. Yet when they ... Read More »

THE head of Church aid agency Caritas Australia says Australia’s strategic pivot towards the Pacific region, including the introduction of long-term loans for new projects, ignores needs and priorities identified by the region’s political and Church leaders. Caritas Australia chief executive officer Paul O’Callaghan said “climate-change financing and local aid are really what Pacific Islanders are calling for”. Mr O’Callaghan ... Read More »

TWO months after being baptised a Catholic, former governor-general and declared atheist Bill Hayden is eagerly anticipating the joy of his First Holy Communion. “It will be exciting because I have never done it before in my life,” the sharp-witted, but frail 85-year-old said as he considered his new-found faith journey. Speaking from his farm outside Ipswich, Queensland, where he ... Read More »

ON the Pacific Island nation of Vanuatu nurse Dominic Viratos sometimes treks many hours across Pentecost Island delivering life-saving vaccines to vulnerable children. A slow journey from the island’s Catholic mission hospital in Melsisi through thick jungle often takes him to remote villages where no vehicle can travel. Delivering vaccines by foot means that the tiny hospital, founded by Marist ... Read More »

A VISIT to Jerusalem can be an opportunity for pilgrimage, reflection and quiet prayer at holy sites. It is also an extraordinary window into the reality of an ancient city in a conflicted land. It’s easy to lose yourself in the winding, cobblestone alleyways of old Jerusalem amidst the jostle, the lively conversations in Arabic and Hebrew, and with the ... Read More »

HISTORIC St Stephen’s Cathedral is set to become the new centrepiece of Christmas celebrations in Brisbane, with a free light and sound spectacular each night the last two weeks of Advent. People of all ages are expected to gather on the grassed courtyard outside the cathedral to witness “Lights of Christmas”, a visually exciting multi-media show projected onto St Stephen’s ... Read More »

AS the summer swelter approaches and household power use spikes, energy consultant Anne Armansin has a tip for Queenslanders struggling to pay rising energy bills. “Fans first, not air conditioning,” Anne Armansin, who works in partnership with the St Vincent de Paul Society, said. “And if you are using air conditioning, maintain a temperature no lower than 24 degrees Celsius.” ... Read More »