The Catholic community’s multicultural population is continuing to grow and develop and this raises significant pastoral issues. These are the results of the Archdiocese of Wellington’s just-released two-year review of its ethnic communities. “The Review was a response to the recommendation from the 2017 Synod,” says Maya Bernardo, the Archdiocese’s Launch Out Programme Formator and Read more
Last Sunday at Mass, the Parish Priest, a sensible, experienced man, mentioned that next week we’d have First Communion, and increased numbers of people were expected at Mass. Then he smiled and said: ‘We probably won’t see them again the following week, but that’s OK.’ I was pleased to hear that. It is of the Read more
The shortest definition of religion is “interruption,” says Bishop Georg Bätzing (pictured). Some forms of continuity people seek from religion are “frankly suspect,” the president of the German Catholic Bishops’ Conference asserts. Bätzing made the comments during the bishops’ plenary assembly in a live-streamed Mass on Tuesday. In his homily he said “all too surely Read more
A new Government funding scheme looks set to make schools in “low-decile” areas worse off, a New Zealand Herald article says. Those in South Auckland look to be particularly affected by the new equity index, especially those with Pasifika students, it claims. Māngere’s De La Salle College, for instance, is reportedly likely to lose about Read more
John Paul College art students are excited to have their hard work displayed in an exhibition, and are even more thrilled that money raised from sales will help the Rotorua Hospital Chaplaincy team. The exhibition will run from Tuesday, September 27 to Saturday, October 1 at Third Place Cafe on Lake Rd. Claire Worrall, Head Read more
A group of Belgian Catholic bishops have defied the Vatican by introducing blessing ceremonies for same-sex couples in their dioceses. The bishops of Flanders also published a liturgy for the celebration of homosexual unions. “In doing so, they are going directly against the Vatican,” reported the Dutch newspaper Nederlands Dagblad. The Vatican clarified in March Read more
A report on the 10-month US synod process has highlighted that Catholics are hurting from clergy abuse cases, and seek a church focused on lifelong spiritual, pastoral and catechetical formation as disciples. Participants were also concerned about the division between US Catholics and their bishops. They voiced a need for a welcoming church of “lived Read more
The current synod, whose title may seem abstruse — a “Synod on Synodality” —, is perhaps best expressed by the three words that follow its title: “Communion, Participation and Mission”. I want to emphasize the call to mission. This is indeed what the Lord asks for in the final lines of the Gospels, including that Read more
When Catholics in Germany recently gathered for their latest session of the Synodal Path, there were tensions around a text arguing that current Church dogma; teachings on sexual morality need to evolve. Several bishops at the September 8-11 assembly baulked at the proposal. But Cardinal Reinhard Marx of Munich and Freising, who is currently a Read more
Raging suicide statistics have led an American Catholic diocese to create a mental health ministry. The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention reports over twice as many people died in 2020 by their own hand rather than someone else’s. Once considered a mortal sin, suicide is viewed much more moderately today. By bringing suicide Read more