Religion and Faith
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Cavan Hogue. Shia vs Sunni in Iran and Saudi Arabia.
Saudi Arabia’s execution of a Shia cleric who criticised its policies has exacerbated the split between Shia and Sunni Nations. Politics and religion have come together in a way that will be familiar to anyone who knows Northern Ireland. Sunni Saudi Arabia is the home of the deviant puritanical Wahabi sect which is rejected by Continue reading »
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Pope Francis’ frightening invitation to freedom.
I found this article very good reading for Christmas and the holiday season. It gives a very good account of where Pope Francis is heading. The article highlights the often-quoted comment from the Scriptures that the Sabbath is made for man and not man for the Sabbath. The author Tom Roberts is Editor at Large Continue reading »
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What is the driving force behind Jihadist terrorism?
In this article, (link below) Olivier Roy identifies the patterns of radicalism which have led to terrorism. He describes these patterns Frustration and resentment against society seems to be the only psychological trait they share. The majority of the radicals come from second generation Muslims born in Europe Many have histories of petty delinquency and Continue reading »
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Culture and Religion, Defence and Security, Immigration, refugees, Media, Politics, Religion and Faith, World Affairs
Magical thinking about ISIS.
Adam Shatz is the contributing editor at the London Review of Books. He lives in New York. In this article he says ‘The attacks in Paris don’t reflect a clash of civilisations, but rather the fact that we really do live in a single, if unequal world, where the torments in one region inevitably spill Continue reading »
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Frank Brennan SJ. Free speech and the plebiscite on same sex marriage
Chris Puplick, a former senator and former president of the NSW Anti-Discrimination Board, is one of a rising chorus expressing strong objections to the Australian Catholic bishops daring to evangelise and speak publicly about their views on same sex marriage. Writing in The Australian on 5 December 2015, Puplick asserts: ‘When a person or group of Continue reading »
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Barney Zwartz. Christianity is dying out? Don’t count on it.
Repost from 10/10/2015 Recent predictions (and perhaps hopes) about Christianity’s demise in the West have been greatly exaggerated. But to the extent that the faith does disappear, it will be greatly missed, writes Barney Zwartz. Predicting social trends is usually an inexact science, but England’s influential Spectator magazine has boldly put a precise date on Continue reading »
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Moira Rayner. Corrupt churches need women leaders
Lord Acton said that ‘Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.’ It was in correspondence about the then pope’s proposed new doctrine of papal infallibility. It is often overlooked that he added, ‘Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority; still more when you superadd the tendency of Continue reading »
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Caroline Coggins. Christmas and weed mats
Weed mats are used to grow a garden. A weed mat lets us relax and focus on what we want to grow. There’s no need to labour over all the weeds that need pulling, make neat rows and certainly not break up the top soil, destroying the ‘nature’ of the soil. What we actually want Continue reading »
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Michael Kelly SJ. As Holy Mother Church has always taught.
At times I have to pinch myself to be alert to what’s going on right now in the Catholic Church and to fathom the depth of it. Throughout history, we have seen change come abruptly. It happened in Europe and Japan after WWII. And in Eastern Europe after the Berlin Wall came down when democracies Continue reading »
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Peter Day. The Cupboard.
“There you go, Peter, today’s pay. Don’t waste it.” “Thank you, Mr Boss; I can now buy some paint for my cupboard. Have a good night, Mr Boss, I’m going home now.” “Okay, Peter, see you tomorrow … same time?” “Yes, Mr Boss, same time, same time: fifty-five past 8 o’clock in the morning.” It Continue reading »
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Eric Hodgens. Christmas Peace – A Paradox
Christmas is a Christian afterthought. The earliest Christian writings (Paul’s epistles and Mark’s Gospel) don’t mention Jesus’ birth. The first to do so is Matthew’s gospel where the author posits the birth simply as another event in the fuller story of God’s salvation of His people. Luke’s gospel has the more discursive story containing Mary Continue reading »
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Tony Doherty. Removing the wrapping and ribbons from Christmas.
Do you know the story of the birth of Jesus? What a silly question! At this time of year, it is impossible to escape it. Children remind us in their charming Christmas plays. Shopping centres play carols until we could scream. Television programmers dust off their 1950’s biblical dramas. Churches decorate cribs – the odd Continue reading »
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Culture and Religion, Defence and Security, Immigration, refugees, Politics, Religion and Faith, World Affairs
The Refugees and the New War.
In the New York Review of Books, Michael Ignatieff draws a link between failure of Western policy in the Middle East, it’s failure to counter ISIS and the resulting refugee flow into Europe. He says ‘ISIS wants to convince the world of the world’s indifference to the suffering of Muslims; so we should demonstrate the Continue reading »
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Paul Collins. Three wise people.
In the last eighteen months Australian Catholicism has lost three of its great leaders, people who genuinely contributed not only to the church, but also to our social and cultural life. They were Professor Max Charlesworth who died on 2 June 2014, Sister Veronica Brady who died on 20 August 2015, and Father Frank Martin Continue reading »
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Andrew Ailes. Does Charity Begin At Home?
Christmas comes but once a year, When in the northern hemisphere, The cold winds blow, the sun goes down, Now every day some children drown. The Christmas story’s full of hope, Yet life and death hang by a rope. It’s not the sword of Damocles, It’s shipwreck in the angry seas. The icy waves show Continue reading »
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Peter Day. God: tiny, unassuming; lying at our feet
To some of us it’s a time to pause, to reflect, to stand in awe. But to the vast majority of us it’s the silly season: a time of over-eating, drinking, buying, selling, worrying, partying, beaching, and pressured family gatherings. And don’t the silly season preachers love it; out of hibernation they come to herald Continue reading »
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Kieran Tapsell. Finnigan’s Wake
When Dorothy Parker was told that President Calvin Coolidge had just died, she remarked: “How can they tell?” I was reminded of this while watching the moribund memory of Bishop Brian Finnigan when giving evidence to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. Finnigan showed all the tell-tale signs of being physically Continue reading »
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Michael Kelly SJ. Treating Islam’s clerics like their Christian equivalents will save lives
There is an unexpected upside to the mayhem and carnage across the world, visited on the unsuspecting innocents of countries where Muslims are not a majority of the population – Europe and beyond. It’s something the Catholic Church has had to learn, too. And that is the simple fact that that misbehavior among religious adherents Continue reading »
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Joanna Thyer. When we are not sure, we are alive.
What do Pope Francis, Thomas Merton and Graham Greene have in common? Like Pope Francis, Thomas Merton and Graham Greene were individuals whose sheer complexity equipped them to address the often contradictory world we live in, in order to find God in it. The writer and Trappist monk Thomas Merton, the famous British writer, Graham Continue reading »
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Frank Brennan SJ. Cardinal Pell, his lawyers and the Royal Commission
The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is about to recommence its case study on the Catholic Church in Ballarat. Last week, the Melbourne Herald Sun reported: ‘Victims of child sexual abuse look set to be grilled by lawyers for Cardinal George Pell in a bid to quash explosive allegations he was Continue reading »
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Francis Sullivan. Learning As We Go: The Pope Models the Change the Church Needs
Francis Sullivan ABC Religion and Ethics 12 Nov 2015 Ever since the conclusion of the recent Synod in Rome, I have been thinking about the signals of change that Pope Francis is sending. He does it in words and by his disposition. Observers at the Synod frequently commented on the informal and casual style of the Pope. He mixed Continue reading »
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Peter Day. Hatred won’t stop me patting the dog.
Hatred won’t stop me patting the dog By Peter Day New York, London, Bali, Madrid, Israel, Beirut, Egypt, Nigeria, Sydney, Paris: on and on it goes, the list of nations and cities left bereft after yet another act of terror. It puts one’s inner-being out of whack; could even threaten to derail one’s sense of Continue reading »
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Michael Kelly SJ. Paris: the problem is deeper than criminal acts
There’s something profoundly rotten about cultures that can give birth to the murderous behaviour on show in Paris last Friday. This is just the latest and probably most visible instance because it happened in one of the hubs of the European and North American news media. These hubs make things that happen in too many Continue reading »
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Eric Hodgens. Hope After The Synod?
In Greek synod means on the way together – (odos means a way; syn means together). The model is peripatetic– walking around. Aristotle used to walk round with his disciples discussing issues and his school got called the Peripatetic School. The Synod of Bishops was set up after Vatican II and met in 1967, 1971 Continue reading »
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Paul Collins. The Synod on the Family – Success or Failure?
I was talking recently about the Synod with a very experienced parish priest. He said that if the bishops thought we were all waiting with bated breath for their decision regarding the divorced remarried receiving Communion, then they really do live in cloud cuckoo-land. Nowadays divorced Catholics don’t just hang around waiting for a bevy Continue reading »
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The Synod on the Family – What’s really happening?
Editorial (No.10, October 2015, updated 16/10/2015) Catholics for Renewal. The 14th General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops Rome, 4-25 October 2015 “The vocation and mission of the family in the Church “ The Synod on the Family – What’s really happening? The Synod on the Family has completed two of its three weeks. Continue reading »
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Robert Mickens. The Pope’s Opposition.
It has been known for quite some time that a number of cardinals and bishops, both in Rome and abroad, are – to put it mildly – uncomfortable with the way Pope Francis’ pontificate is unfolding. Well, this week it all spilled out into the open when it was revealed that several cardinals – including three Continue reading »
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Michael Kelly SJ. George Pell’s own goal.
A Catholic friend of mine who spent his professional life as a journalist at what was the then rather WASPISH Melbourne Age told me in the 1980s that two sports dominated that paper’s pages – Australian Rules football and Catholic fights. Cardinal George Pell should have stuck to playing Ozzie Rules. In that game, shirt Continue reading »
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Kieran Tapsell. The Royal Commission – Damning with faint understatement.
The reports issued by the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse at times seem quietly understated. The Commission seems to invite readers to draw their own conclusions – damning or otherwise – from the facts the Commission has found. This is particularly true of its report into its Case Study No Continue reading »
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Kieran Tapsell. Keeping the Australian people in the dark.
On 22 April 2013, Francis Sullivan, the CEO of the Truth, Justice and Healing Council (“TJHC”) that represents the Australian Catholic Church at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, said: “The Australian community has been kept in the dark for too long.” Indeed it has, and since the setting up of Continue reading »