Keywords: Connection
There are more than 200 results, only the first 200 are displayed here.
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AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 04 August 2022
8 Comments
It is easy to view homelessness from a distance as only a failure of economic policy and of the political responsibility to deliver material goods. A home, however, is more than a house. It connotes connections that are central to humanity. Left without a home people are deprived of more than bricks and mortar; they are diminished in their humanity.
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AUSTRALIA
- Michael McVeigh
- 28 July 2022
15 Comments
There has been much said in recent days about the refusal of a group of Manly Sea Eagles footballers to wear a special Pride jersey. The boycotting players have been labelled as hypocrites (for taking a stand on this issue and not, for example, gambling or domestic violence) and even hateful for their actions. Many say they would be happy to see them sacked from the club entirely. It seems to me, though, that the attitudes of the Manly players deserve more consideration than this.
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AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 27 July 2022
2 Comments
Over recent weeks many people have expressed alarm and despondence at the rising number of infections and deaths from COVID. Just as we were enjoying freedom from restrictions we found ourselves encouraged to work from home if possible and to wear masks. The crisis and the recommendations recall the first onset of COVID in Australia. Yet the response of Governments is much less forceful. The differences between the responses and the reasons for them merit reflection.
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AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 27 July 2022
1 Comment
In some ways this habit of association of ordinary personal life with the epic figures of literature or history marks a return to childhood. In it admired figures have a mythical status. I used to imagine that if, in my hand I had a Don Bradman bat, on my cap a Neil Harvey badge, or Mopsy Fraser’s number on my back, their skills would become mine. They never seemed to.
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AUSTRALIA
- Melinda Tankard Reist
- 20 July 2022
2 Comments
Exposure to pornography has been linked to an increase in in sexually aggressive behaviour and adolescent dating violence. This mass, industrial-level grooming of our young is causing lasting damage to their social and sexual development and leading to even more women and girls being viewed as less human.
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AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 30 June 2022
11 Comments
If NAIDOC and of the Australian Catholic Church are to achieve their goals time and patience will be required. Yet both show signs of justifiable impatience. This year the theme of NAIDOC Week is Get Up! Stand Up! Show Up! Its tone is urgent, expressing frustration at the resistance to change but also the recognition that new possibilities have opened.
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Juliette Hughes
- 28 June 2022
1 Comment
How do we know that what we call knowledge is knowledge? How do we know that we know? The two books I have been reading here are both about kinds of knowing. Suzie Sheehy is a particle physicist from my old stamping ground, Melbourne University. Sheehy’s story is of passionate hunters for nothing less than the meaning of everything.
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AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 23 June 2022
7 Comments
Since the Federal Election one of the most refreshing features has been the new Prime Minister’s connection with people. Whether it is shown by riding a bamboo bicycle with the Indonesian President, expressing sympathy for the Nadesilingam family for their prolonged ordeal before returning to Biloela or agreeing with Jacinda Ardern, herself a model of public empathy, about the unreasonableness of expelling to New Zealand people who had never lived there, his actions displayed a readiness to listen and to enter the experience of other people.
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AUSTRALIA
Concern about political malfeasance in Australian politics was one of the issues that drove the influx of new members (mainly women) into the Australian Parliament on 21 May, and they are promising a raft of reforms. The astounding thing is that we managed to leverage the change of 21 May 2022 within the confines of a system that inherently favours the status quo, the preferential voting system tending to channel votes back to the major parties.
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EDUCATION
- Chris Middleton
- 23 May 2022
7 Comments
Perhaps the most dramatic individual result of the Federal election was that Menzies’s seat, Kooyong, has fallen to a Teal independent, Dr Monique Ryan. Xavier College sits in the Kooyong electorate, and Dr Ryan is a parent at the College. Dr Ryan proved to be an impressive candidate who ran as a good a local campaign as I have ever seen. It was marked by a strong engagement by many locals, and especially among professional women, and older residents.
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RELIGION
I have always considered myself pro-life. It’s not something I’ve felt a need to wear as a badge of honour, rather it has always been a default position. But terminology matters. Indeed, frequently, calling myself pro-life has drawn the derision or raised eyebrows of people around me, nuns and priests and radical ratbags alike, it has connotations.
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AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 11 May 2022
7 Comments
In the election campaign the need for an integrity commission has been a minor issue. Many independent candidates have supported it, but the major parties seem to have concluded that it will not significantly shape the way people vote. Yet given the evidence of a lack of integrity in behaviour by and within governing parties both at Federal and State level, the nature and importance of integrity in the processes of government deserve reflection.
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