A QUEENSLAND bishop removed from office in 2011 by Pope Benedict has said Catholic school principals were emerging as the voice and the heartbeat of the Church in local communities and needed to be listened to. Bishop Bill Morris, the former Bishop of Toowoomba, has called for greater dialogue within the Church as a way of moving forward and past ... Read More »
ABOUT 80 people have held a peaceful prayer vigil outside a Brisbane university art gallery, in protest against a “blasphemous” artwork depicting the Virgin Mary cradling male genitalia. A vigil organiser said the aim was “to bear public witness to our faith and devotion to our Blessed Mother, and to make public reparation to her immaculate Heart for this grave ... Read More »
A CATHOLIC priest has told how he prayed in the middle of the night at a shrine on the Gold Coast hinterland surrounded by fire, and fearing for the safety of dozens of pilgrims staying in nearby cabins. “I was on my knees with the rosary beads in the chapel and praying for protection from Heaven,” Pauline Father Albert Wasniowski ... Read More »
TWENTY years after East Timor’s historic vote for independence, the Marist Brothers are being recognised for their work helping to rebuild the new nation’s shattered schools and to train teachers. East Timor was left in ruins after the Indonesian military retreated from the half-island state in 1999, burning and looting – 80 per cent of schools were destroyed, while 90 ... Read More »
CATHOLIC school enrolments have fallen, and fewer poor and marginalised families find they can send their children to Catholic schools. “Our growth rate is below the state sector and the independent schools, and that is a worrying position to be in,” Queensland Catholic Education Commission executive director Dr Lee-Anne Perry told Catholic secondary school principals holding their biennial state conference ... Read More »
PREPARING the next generation for the workforce will require a huge shift in education and culture, according to a leading social researcher. “Our world is changing, our work is changing, and therefore our approach needs changing,” Ashley Fell has told Queensland’s Catholic secondary school principals meeting in Townsville. Young Australians – Gen Z’s, aged between 10 and 24 – and ... Read More »
ONE of the three judges in Cardinal George Pell’s appeal has compared the cardinal’s conviction “beyond reasonable doubt” to that of Lindy Chamberlain. Lindy Chamberlain was accused, convicted by a jury and jailed for the murder of her baby, Azaria, who had been taken by a dingo at Uluru in central Australia in 1980. Mrs Chamberlain was eventually exonerated, her ... Read More »
AUSTRALIAN Catholic Bishops Conference president Brisbane Archbishop Mark Coleridge, doesn’t believe proposed Queensland laws to break the seal of confession would make children any safer. The state’s Labor Government has proposed legislation that would force priests to report admissions of child sexual abuse to police. “We understand why the Royal Commission made its recommendation on the seal and why the ... Read More »
CATHOLIC filmmaker Kevin Dunn has a clear, passionate message when it comes to euthanasia and assisted suicide. “I love life. It’s a gift, and we need to protect it, at all costs,” he said. The Canadian father-of-six has spent much of the past five years investigating the impacts and expansion of euthanasia and assisted-suicide laws throughout the world. Now he ... Read More »
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