FORMER Brisbane Catholic teacher Ora Duffley has welcomed the release of her charity worker friends from captivity in Iraq. French Catholics Antoine Brochon, Julien Dittmar, Alexandre Goodarzy and Iraqi Catholic Tariq Mattoka were released after being held captive for 66 days while working for SOS Chretiens d’Orient in Baghdad. The Catholic charity workers were captured on January 20 and returned ... Read More »
AUSTRALIA has launched its mobile COVIDSafe App with an eye to controlling outbreaks and easing restrictions by having contact tracing systems in place by informing people who have had contact with those who test positive to coronavirus. The app can be downloaded from the Apple App store or Google Play store onto a mobile device. Once it is installed, the ... Read More »
IT is the stones and clubs, the engines of martyrdom, that transform in the protomartyrs into the Living Bread, Brisbane Archbishop Mark Coleridge said on the feast of St Stephen and protomartyr of Oceania, St Peter Chanel. “Today we hear from Scripture of bread and stones,” Archbishop Coleridge said at the 8am Mass livestreamed from St Stephen’s Cathedral. “Jesus says, ... Read More »
PRISON chaplains and hospital pastoral carers are doing their best to keep their ministries alive despite being kept away from prisoners and patients because of COVID-19. Brisbane archdiocese’s Centacare Pastoral Ministries director Judy Norris said chaplains were unable to visit prisons and most of Centacare’s pastoral carers have had to withdraw from hospitals, leaving only a skeleton team allowed limited ... Read More »
POPE Francis asked Catholics to make a special effort in May to pray the Rosary, knowing that by doing so they would be united with believers around the world asking for Mary’s intercession in stopping the coronavirus pandemic. “Contemplating the face of Christ with the heart of Mary, our mother, will make us even more united as a spiritual family ... Read More »
A young Brisbane Catholic working as a paramedic on the streets of London has described the grim, dangerous task of collecting sick and dying patients stricken by the coronavirus. “People are very scared and anxious… so they call 999,” 34-year-old David Armour recounted, clearly affected by what he sees during a typical paramedic shift. The Brisbane paramedic and his wife ... Read More »
IN the midst of this global pandemic, Bishop Robert Barron says: “Turn this time of waiting into an evangelical opportunity…” In an exclusive, wide-ranging interview with Zenit, the Auxiliary Bishop of Los Angeles and founder of Word on Fire Catholic Ministries, made this suggestion, as he reflected on various ways faithful can reconnect spiritually during this dramatic time. In the ... Read More »
A BISHOP, who died on Easter Sunday after a lifetime of ministry in some of the most difficult places in which to be a Christian, has been praised for his “courageous and dynamic apostolate in the heart of Islam”. Comboni Missionary Bishop Camillo Ballin, who died aged 75 after on a long illness on April 12, ministered across the Middle ... Read More »
Deacon Gary Stone – the veterans’ padre and president of the Veterans Care Association – talks about the ANZAC Spirit and facing the COVID-19 challenge as a nation. WE celebrate Anzac Day in unusual circumstances this year. The energy and camaraderie of gathered activities is not possible due to the coronavirus, but the spirit of Anzac remains. Our Prime Minister ... Read More »
The Catholic Leader Keeping Faith with You
