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Keywords: Critic

  • RELIGION

    Cardinal Pell's parting salvo raises questions for the Australian Church

    • John Warhurst
    • 31 January 2023
    17 Comments

    Last year, the late Cardinal George Pell anonymously published a memorandum that criticized Pope Francis and his vision of a synodal church and condemned the Synod as a ‘catastrophe’, Cardinal Pell's memo signals building tensions between different visions for the future of the Church in Australia.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Nicaragua’s Catholic Church: A nuanced conflict

    • Antonio Castillo
    • 01 September 2022
    2 Comments

    In Nicaragua, Catholic priests and institutions are under siege. In the last five months, the Ortega regime has increased its persecution of the Church, accusing them of being ‘terrorists.’ The conflict has been further exacerbated by the detention of Bishop Rolando Álvarez, the most outspoken critic of Ortega. In less than four years, the Church has suffered 190 attacks, including a fire in the Cathedral of Managua. However, the crisis in Nicaragua is not as clear-cut as it might seem.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Everyone’s a critic

    • Juliette Hughes 
    • 16 August 2022
    1 Comment

    Five years ago, the beloved and I were in a reality show called Everyone’s a Critic. The show took us all to art galleries, mostly in Melbourne and Sydney, plonked us in front of some artworks, asking us to say what we thought of them. I realised TV norms being what they are, that we could have a ten-minute conversation about artists with whom we were familiar and all that would make it onto the program would be ten seconds of me mentioning my mum.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Reducing flood risk in Lismore starts with better data

    • Jerry Vanclay
    • 19 July 2022

    How is it that Lismore, one of the most flood-prone towns in Australia, can be so ill-prepared and so badly affected by floods this year? Flood frequency is critical information, so you might expect that such guidance was based on the best available data – but this does not appear to be so.

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  • ENVIRONMENT

    Wanted: A liberal dose of climate action

    • Stephen Minas
    • 09 June 2022
    9 Comments

    The Liberal wipeout in inner-city electorates is without precedent in Australian politics. For the Liberal Party, ‘existential crisis’ is not an overstatement. As the party founded by Robert Menzies finds itself in the hall of mirrors, climate policy should be a major focus of critical self-appraisal.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    In the name of Kyrill

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 31 May 2022
    7 Comments

    Patriarch Kyrill of Moscow has received much justified criticism for aligning his Church alongside Vladimir Putin in the invasion of Ukraine. If we are to understand how he could think it is right to do so, however, it is helpful to know how he came to be Kyrill. The story of his earlier namesakes illuminate the conduct of the present Patriarch of Moscow. 

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  • RELIGION

    Roe vs Wade: The Bishops’ dilemma

    • Miles Pattenden
    • 26 May 2022
    19 Comments

    News leaked earlier this month that the US Supreme Court plans to overturn its most famous decision, that in Roe vs Wade (1973) which protects a pregnant woman's freedom to choose to have an abortion without excessive government restriction. The decision has attracted much criticism both in the past and now on account of its dubious legal reasoning – in particular, its attempt to link the right to abort to a right to privacy which itself was notional and not specified in the US Constitution.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    Outgrowing apartheid: FW de Klerk

    • Binoy Kampmark
    • 23 November 2021
    51 Comments

    The passing of South Africa’s last apartheid president, FW de Klerk, raises pressing questions about a complex historical character who, according to his brother, Willem de Klerk, slowly outgrew apartheid. In a critical sense, he was bound, understandably, by both time and context: race, the need to defend a racial hierarchy, the historical role of a segregationist system that saw his all-white National Party retain power for decades. 

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Falling on one's sword

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 14 October 2021
    16 Comments

    During her last year in office Gladys Berejiklian divided people over her response to the Coronavirus. Even her critics, however, praised her decision to resign from office after the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) announced that it was investigating her conduct. 

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  • RELIGION

    Critical Race Theory and the question of social sin

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 05 August 2021
    60 Comments

    Critical Race Theory, which has recently been banned ineffectively by the Australian Senate from the National Curriculum, has everything going for it as a lightning rod. It has an acronym (CRT), opacity and an air of self-importance. It is also associated with a controversial social movement: Black Lives Matter. The theory does not need to be understood before generating heat.

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  • EDUCATION

    Why we need tertiary religious studies and theology

    • Caolan Ware
    • 17 June 2021
    34 Comments

    The tertiary level is designed to promote change and innovation. If there is no tertiary level, there is no growth in our understanding of global religious systems, and no emerging individuals who possess critical thinking skills and historical knowledge of these systems. Without these individuals, there’s a risk that religious institutions will become more insular, regressive, disconnected and, most disastrously, unchecked. 

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  • RELIGION

    Wherever faith resides

    • Julian Butler
    • 29 April 2021
    103 Comments

    Even as it is an ‘inner light’, illuminating all else, having faith isn’t without critical reason. Philip’s ‘appreciative but never uncritical’ approach to faith might be said to characterise the approach of a growing number of young people, too.  

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