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Keywords: Counselling

  • RELIGION

    Advice for the Pope on reforming the Church

    • Geraldine Doogue
    • 24 September 2013
    35 Comments

    I wish he would invite me to be his temporary consultant, to offer him advice for his next 500 days. I'd begin by proposing a substantial Vatican-led inquiry, into why the Church has been so troubled by sexual abuse across various countries. Then I would point to the experiences of several large secular institutions, including the New York Times and US Army, that have rebuilt after crises.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Crying chairs' cold comfort for refugees

    • Lyn Bender
    • 24 July 2013
    5 Comments

    I watched the 'crying chairs' from my psychology clinic disappear into the truck. Many people over the years had nestled in one of those voluminous chairs and wept, whispered, or shouted their rage, sorrow and despair. Now it was time to leave my counselling office so I surrendered my sturdy armchairs for a greater good.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Dangers of gay conversion

    • Luke Williams
    • 19 October 2012
    36 Comments

    My first encounter with gay reparative therapy (GRT) was the day I summoned the courage to ask a friend about the cluster of scars on his wrists. The Australian Psychological Society recognises conversion therapy as harmful to individuals' mental health. Yet GRT of minors is unregulated, and in the case of Christian ex-gay groups often run by unqualified laypeople.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    When humanity came second to research

    • Lyn Bender
    • 08 May 2012
    10 Comments

    The experimenters' intent was to observe the capacity of first year students to inflict pain by electrically shocking others. Many of the subjects were traumatised as though they had in fact committed acts of torture. Paradoxically the latest revelations may mean the researchers themselves need counselling.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Gay Christians' church trauma

    • Tim Kroenert
    • 12 April 2012
    23 Comments

    'God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve,' quips the pastor from the pulpit. The congregation finds this hilarious, but not young gay Christian Ben, who feels secretly shamed. Later, when a string of Christian counselling programs fail to 'heal' his homosexuality, Ben takes to his wrists with a razor blade.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    When 'sorry' is not enough

    • Mark Green
    • 26 May 2011

    The US Catholic Bishops' pastoral letter 'Economic Justice for All' says the extent of the suffering of the poor 'is a measure of how far we are from being a true community'. It is difficult to imagine how justice can be done for the Stolen Generations without compensation, redress and reparation.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Christmas gallows

    • Charlotte Clutterbuck
    • 22 December 2010
    1 Comment

    Despair, Damnation, and Capital Punishment are my Christmas fare this year. During my research into literary executions, I was shocked to find so few cases where they were opposed on Christian grounds, and so many examples of Christian acceptance.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    The hard life and death of Tyler the Sorrowful

    • Moira Rayner
    • 27 October 2010
    11 Comments

    Tyler Cassidy was a very upset, masked child on the day he was shot dead by police. They saw a boy who sounded like a man, playing 'dare' with a deadly weapon. Any parent will know that confronting an enraged teenage boy and advancing on him with threats is not likely to result in submission.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Inside Canberra's Catholic lobby

    • Frank Quinlan
    • 18 August 2010
    11 Comments

    This election we consider a PM who is doubted because of her atheism, an Opposition Leader who is doubted for being too 'Catholic', and the Greens who are doubted as being anti-Christian. Church social agencies have been involved in important issues with each of these groups.

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  • RELIGION

    Patient autonomy and the doctor's conscience

    • Frank Brennan
    • 18 September 2009
    4 Comments

    In Life and Death: How do we honour the Patient's Autonomy and the Doctor's Conscience? Frank Brennan's Sandra David Oration at St Vincent's Clinic, Darlinghurst, Sydney, 17 September 2009.

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  • RELIGION

    Right to lifers miss the point

    • Frank Brennan
    • 19 August 2009
    31 Comments

    Last week a Supreme Court judge gave a sensible decision regarding the case of a quadriplegic man who wants his carers to discontinue feeding him. 'Right to life' and 'right to die' advocates have had a field day. You'd think they had not read the judgment.

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  • RELIGION

    Vilification laws fuel disharmony

    • Frank Brennan
    • 11 May 2009
    2 Comments

    While it is inherently racist for a person to claim membership of the best race, it is no bad thing for a religious person to claim membership of the one true religion. That is what religious people do.

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