I HAVE recently had a number of conversations with various people on the subject of the cultural composition of the presbyterate in Australia. In light of the increasing number of priests from overseas that are ministering in this country, the whole notion of what it means to serve a particular community seems to have been highlighted in many minds. ... Read More »
BRISBANE Archbishop Mark Coleridge celebrated Mass last month with priests from the Missionary Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament (MCBS) serving in Queensland at St. Joachim church in Holland park and Mt. Gravatt parish in Brisbane . Archbishop Coleridge joined MCBS priests from Brisbane, Toowoomba and Townsville for the occasion that marked the Congregation’s 86th anniversary, founded in 1933 at Mallappally, ... Read More »
WHAT he described as “text messages from God” was part of Mick Greathead’s discernment to officially enter Holy Spirit Provincial Seminary, Banyo, last month. The 20-year-old, raised a stone’s throw from his new surroundings among 22 other seminarians, said God often prompted a priestly vocation from his mid-teens, but it wasn’t always a shared mindset. “As a teenager, I’d go ... Read More »
AT a time when the average age of Catholics in Australia is 59, it has been good to celebrate the Year of Youth which is now coming to an end. Perhaps it would’ve been better to have a decade of youth, but the year was a promising start. One thing that happened in the Year of Youth was the worldwide ... Read More »
TORRENTIAL rain may have brought an entire Indian state under water, killing hundreds and leaving thousands stranded, but the people of Kerala have showed awe-inspiring resilience. Kerala’s monsoon season gave way to the state’s worst floods in 100 years, claiming the lives of 445 people and destroying entire properties. More than 220,000 people have been forced to take up refuge ... Read More »
CLERGY advocacy groups representing more than 2000 priests across Australia have rejected outright breaking the seal of confession, even if it becomes law in some states and territories. The National Council of Priests of Australia, with 1700 members, rejects new laws announced in South Australia, Tasmania, the ACT and Western Australia –which would require priests to break the seal of ... Read More »
PRIME Minister Malcolm Turnbull is to deliver a national apology to survivors of institutional child sexual abuse on October 22. “Now we have uncovered the shocking truth we must do everything in our power to honour the bravery of the thousands of people who came forward,” Mr Turnbull said, announcing the Federal Government’s formal response to the Royal Commission into ... Read More »
THE Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has exposed “catastrophic failure” in Church leadership in the Diocese of Ballarat. “That failure led to the suffering and often irreparable harm to children, their families and the wider community,” commissioners said in a report released today (November 6). “That harm could have been avoided if the Church had acted ... Read More »
BRISBANE’S two parishes run by the Divine Word Missionaries hold the key to attaining world peace, the congregation’s superior general Fr Heinz Kuluke says. The leader for six years of the Society of the Divine Word, the world’s largest missionary congregation, said the intercultural make-up of the Inala and Kingston-Marsden parishes where his missionaries worked “would change the world”. “I ... Read More »
The Catholic Leader Keeping Faith with You
