Keywords: Mass
There are more than 200 results, only the first 200 are displayed here.
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INTERNATIONAL
- Binoy Kampmark
- 20 June 2022
11 Comments
In the context of mass school shootings in the United States, the latest of which took place at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, a crude form of deterrence has made an appearance. To be safer, you do not remove guns, but spread them through a policy of mutually assured terror. Any gun toting individual entering the school grounds will think twice before encountering the hail of bullets from a protective teacher. Gun control, accordingly, becomes anathema.
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AUSTRALIA
- Michael Kelly
- 16 June 2022
3 Comments
The Court in Mabo, where Brennan J led majority, put an end to the notion of Terra Nullius, by which the British could claim that land in Australia was ripe for the picking because it belonged to no one, and opened the claims to land ownership to a much wider group including the traditional owners. The follow-up judgement in Wik took that understanding even further.
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RELIGION
- Elizabeth Young
- 15 June 2022
3 Comments
Should women be considered for ministry as deacon? Should Pope Francis authorise such ministry? This topic often raises emotions, and strong views either for or against. This is one of the questions posed by Motion 54 to the Church’s July Plenary Council session, where members will amend and vote on 105 motions, prompted by the question, ‘What do you think God is asking of us in Australia at this time?’ Motion 54 is one to watch.
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ENVIRONMENT
- 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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MEDIA
- Michael Kelly
- 30 May 2022
2 Comments
The abrupt passing of a dear friend in a sudden moment is not only something I had not prepared for. I actually looked forward to seeing her in about 36 hours when we would meet up at Sunday Mass. But that wasn’t to be, and the sharp end was not negotiable. There has been an outpouring of dismay, grief and sorrow at the passing of Caroline Jones. She was so poised and self-possessed that moving into her presence was an immediately arresting experience.
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MEDIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 19 May 2022
2 Comments
It is unfortunate that World Communications Day is celebrated in the middle of an election campaign. We have seen the worst of partisan media coverage, of shouting as a preferred form of communication, of endless experts promising Armageddon if the result is not to their taste. And yet we have also seen the best of media informing us of the issues that concern people in different parts of Australia. Without such public communication, for all its defects and excesses, our society would be the poorer.
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INTERNATIONAL
- Andrew Hamilton, David Halliday, Michele Frankeni, Stewart Braun
- 19 May 2022
5 Comments
We are now three months into the Ukraine war. From an invasion it has turned into a war of attrition that has cost many lives, displaced civilians, destroyed cities, and led to sanctions and the making of alliances with effects that have spread suffering far beyond Ukraine. In this Roundtable, Andrew Hamilton SJ, David Halliday, Michele Frankeni and Dr Stewart Braun explore the ethics of the war and likely paths to peace.
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AUSTRALIA
- Dean Ashenden
- 03 May 2022
6 Comments
The danger is that unless commissions and inquiries are accompanied by other ways of telling other truths they will inadvertently help to shrink that national story into the story of victims who in fact have never been only victims, and of unmentioned perpetrators who in fact have never been only perpetrators. They risk preaching to a more-or-less converted majority and to an implacably unconverted minority.
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RELIGION
- Andrew Hamilton
- 03 May 2022
9 Comments
We should not underestimate the difficulty that people who represent independent branches of the same organization face when drawing up an agreed statement on contentious issues. Even the widely applauded Uluru Statement from the Heart did not secure the support of all Indigenous groups. If the Bishops Statement was to be effective it had to be supported, or at least tolerated, by all members of the Conference, despite their differing views about political and church issues and the priority that should be given to them in advocacy.
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AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 21 April 2022
34 Comments
This year Anzac Day promises to be a subdued celebration with local events in which people who have fought in wars and their relatives can take part. Few will be able to travel to Gallipoli to remember the invasion. The focus of the day will remain rightly on the sorrow of war and not on the heroic achievements of soldiers or on deemed distinctive Australian qualities displayed at Gallipoli. The association of soldiers at Gallipoli with footballers playing their games on Anzac Day will seem not only crass but ridiculous.
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ECONOMICS
- Julian Butler
- 31 March 2022
1 Comment
In 2020 as the Covid-19 pandemic raged globally, as Australia shut its borders and some states shut in their people, massive government income support was introduced. The government was a little slow coming to recognise the need for such measures. Once they had, they wanted the support rolled out as quickly as possible. Frydenberg, Scott Morrison and their colleagues recognised that a demand side boost was absolutely necessary to sustain economic activity. The government was uncomfortable, though, with this approach.
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RELIGION
While we have been (barely) coping with a pandemic and natural disasters, the death of a larger-than-life figure like Shane Warne — an ordinary-bloke-cum-sporting-legend, an ever-present companion to Australian audiences, and seemly untouchable — has really brought home the fragility of life. It has drastically reminded us of our mortality: that we don’t live forever.
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