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Keywords: Fires

  • ENVIRONMENT

    Climate denial tide is turning

    • Neil Ormerod
    • 04 November 2013
    47 Comments

    With the publication of the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the Los Angeles Times made the bold decision to no longer publish letters from climate change denialists saying climate change is a matter of fact, not opinion. While this might seem like a small victory, the more substantial issue on the horizon is the global campaign for divestment in the fossil fuel industry. As it gains momentum and fossil fuel companies will be forced to reassess the value of their assets.

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  • RELIGION

    Pope Francis and Australia’s social justice agenda

    • Frank Brennan
    • 24 October 2013

    'Here is a pope who is not just about creating wiggle room or watering down the teachings of the Church. No, he wants to admit honestly to the world that we hold in tension definitive teachings and pastoral yearnings — held together coherently only by mercy and forgiveness.' Frank Brennan's Wallis Lecture presented in Hobart on 24 October 2013 and Launceston on 25 October 2013.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Miriam Rose's clear vision

    • Frank Brennan
    • 23 October 2013
    2 Comments

    'We spent about a week planning the baptism of 12 kids using traditional symbols including the water ceremony to welcome newcomers to country, the firesticks, the smoking, and the ti tree bark to heal and make strong. Miriam has always drawn strength from culture and church no matter what the internal tensions.' Frank Brennan launches the Miriam Rose Foundation at St Mary's Cathedral Darwin.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Bushfires demand response-ability

    • Bronwyn Lay
    • 23 October 2013
    5 Comments

    Human land practices and increasing temperatures alter the earth, and are influenced by politics, law, philosophy and economics. In Lisbon, Western philosophy sought to sever God from nature; now we pretend that the fusion of humans and nature doesn't exist. The term natural disaster shouldn't be trusted. It is superstitious to think humans and nature aren't locked in a reciprocal relationship with political and ethical responsibility.

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  • RELIGION

    Catholics' radical alternative

    • Frank Brennan
    • 10 October 2013
    4 Comments

    'When confronted with moral evil in public policy, church personnel have a choice: to be prophetic sticking to the moral absolutes, or to be practical engaging in the compromises needed to temper the evil. At the moment, the only political parties not wanting to embrace a short term shock and awe approach are the Greens, the DLP and the Palmer United Party. And neither Christine Milne, John Madigan nor Clive Palmer will ever be prime minister.' Workshop paper from Catholic Social Services Victoria's Listening, Learning and Leading conference, October 2013.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Election day reflections on religion in the public square

    • Frank Brennan
    • 07 September 2013
    12 Comments

    How clever of you to choose the day of the federal election for me to offer these reflections.  I come amongst you, not as a publisher or journalist but as an advocate in the public square animated by my own religious tradition as a Jesuit and Catholic priest engaged on human rights issues in a robustly pluralistic democratic society.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Rudd's gay marriage backflip fires church-state debate

    • Ray Cassin
    • 22 May 2013
    62 Comments

    Most responses to Rudd's conversion on gay marriage have focused on the implications for Australia's political dynamic. Those who bother to read the lengthy blog entry in which he announced his change of heart will be drawn into a broader debate about the relationship between church and state that takes place too rarely in Australian politics.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Vegemite interrogation on the Prague night train

    • Anne M. Carson
    • 19 February 2013

    Cash-strapped, post midnight. Transport police rifle our rucksacks, suspicious of backpackers. One prises open my Kodak canister, sniffs, says 'ach!', fires Czech questions at me. 'Vegemite fur frustuck,' I say, trying to convince Vegemite is not hash resin. I smile the smile of someone who doesn't know how bad it can get.

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  • RELIGION

    Eulogy for the 'Martha and Mary' of St Christopher's

    • Frank Brennan
    • 27 November 2012
    1 Comment

    'The sun had finally come to Canberra. Therese was sitting out on the back patio surrounded by children and grandchildren. She had a ticket of leave from the hospital. With grace, humour and gentleness, she recalled that a friend had urged her to live until October when the roses would be in bloom. She schooled us all in beauty and truth even in the midst of adversity.' Frank Brennan's eulogy for Therese Mary Vassarotti.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    A day in the life of a nun

    • Gillian Bouras
    • 03 October 2012
    6 Comments

    The convent has a history of catastrophe at the hands of invaders like the Franks and the Turks, not to mention the earthquake of 1986 and fires of 2007. There are now only two nuns in buildings designed to hold 100. One announces that she would rather someone plunged a dagger in her heart than be forced to leave.

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  • RELIGION

    Religious freedom and the law

    • Frank Brennan
    • 18 September 2012

    'The common law leaves a gap between the mandates of the law and the conduct that we choose to engage in according to our individual moral standards. We call that gap 'freedom'. The challenge is determining the width of that gap for groups bound by religious faith which differs from the Australian majority.' Frank Brennan launches Carolyn Evans' Legal Protection of Religious Freedom in Australia. Full text

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Feather on the breath of god

    • Mark Tredinnick
    • 18 September 2012
    5 Comments

    You, too, despite the false witness of the mirror in your mind, are part, a very small part, of a very old music ... Poetry writes the only prayers you feel free to offer these days. It is the glint in the eye of the god you stopped believing, when she started causing you all this pain.

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