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Keywords: Mary Mackillop

  • RELIGION

    I am pilgrim

    • Ann Rennie
    • 13 September 2024

    People visit graves and castles, libraries and mansions, battlefields and places of historical significance to feel a little of the lives of others, to pay homage, to make that human connection. We make secular pilgrimages to places that we have dreamt about or read in books or seen on screen. Wherever we go, these are ultimately visits to places within.  

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  • AUSTRALIA

    The Productivity Commission's magical thinking

    • Michael McVeigh
    • 25 July 2024

    While proposing broader access to tax deductibility for some charities, the Productivity Commission's new report on charitable giving suggests removing benefits for religious entities. This raises serious questions about the role of religion in fostering charitable giving and the potential consequences of these reforms for Australia's charitable landscape.

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  • FAITH DOING JUSTICE

    The spirit of The Way

    • Michael McGirr
    • 09 September 2022
    5 Comments

    The Way had been a community of homeless people, built around difficult but wonderful characters. It taught me more than I can easily say. It was a world where things were not always as they seemed and people did not fit into little boxes. We had many challenging days and relationships with our guys were seldom easy, but there was an energy that found light in unexpected places.

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  • RELIGION

    A skeleton for the Plenary Council agenda

    • John Warhurst
    • 25 March 2021
    108 Comments

    Continuing the Journey, the working document (or instrumentum laboris), is another stepping stone towards the Plenary Council (PC). How you view this document, provided explicitly both to those few hundred called to be PC participants and to the whole Catholic community, depends very much on your expectations.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    The friendly statues

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 16 July 2020
    6 Comments

    These statues form part of the rich texture of our daily lives, personal histories and cultural environment. They invite tolerant smiles rather than scowls. This article celebrates a selection of friendly Melbourne statues that have reflected places where they and I have stood. It invites you to make your own selection.

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  • RELIGION

    Who speaks for the Catholic church?

    • John Warhurst
    • 18 June 2020
    27 Comments

    Discussion of church life in Australia is incomplete without consideration of who speaks for the church at the national level. The answer to the question 'Who presides over the Catholic church in Australia?’ is more complicated than you might think.

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  • RELIGION

    Australian Catholics take stock as Pell falls

    • John Warhurst
    • 06 March 2019
    61 Comments

    A conservative within a conservative church he was a divisive figure, not just because of his orthodox views but because of the unbending and assertive style with which he promulgated them. Something died in Australian Catholicism with this verdict and Australian Catholics will have to live with that whatever the future turns out to be.

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  • RELIGION

    Supporting those on the margins

    • Frank Brennan
    • 18 February 2019

    'We can do this better by breaking down the silos and binding together our concern for nature, justice for the poor, commitment to society, and interior peace.' Opening Keynote Address by Fr Frank Brennan SJ at the Catholic Social Services Australia National Conference, Port Macquarie 19 February 2019.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    What a good Australia Day might look like

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 23 January 2019
    19 Comments

    The sound of the didgeridoo would be heard throughout the land. On each street corners buskers would mark out their patch, playing violins, oud, piano accordion, berimbau, nyatiti, cello, mouth organ, zither, anklung or daduk singing the love songs and epic poems from the many civilisations that have enriched Australia.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    The confused politics of freedom of religion

    • John Warhurst
    • 12 October 2018
    24 Comments

    The discussion is widely framed as a conflict between secular and religious Australia, as if such entities existed, with secular Australia defending the rights of the LGBTIQ community and religious Australia wanting to shore up its right to discriminate against others on the basis of their sexuality. But it's not that cut and dried.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    On Aboriginal land: seeking a place at the table

    • Frank Brennan
    • 31 May 2017
    6 Comments

    Indigenous leaders this last week have called for the creation of two new legal entities. They want a First Nations Voice enshrined in the Constitution, and a Makarrata Commission set up by legislation. The Makarrata Commission would supervise agreement making between governments and First Nations and engage in truth telling about history. The envisaged destination is a national Makarrata (or treaty). So the immediate constitutional issue is the creation of the First Nations Voice. There is no point in proceeding with a referendum on a question which fails to win the approval of Indigenous Australia. Neither is there any point in proceeding with a referendum which is unlikely to win the approval of the voting public.

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  • RELIGION

    Becoming a church for mission 2030

    • Frank Brennan
    • 17 May 2017

    As the Church of 2030, we need to be more attentive to the contemplation of believers and our experience of spiritual realities, as well as the preaching of the church. Pope Francis has no time whatever for the notion of the Church as a perfect society. But, there is no way that Francis wants to abandon the ideals and the commitment to truth and justice so well exemplified by his predecessors John Paul II and Benedict.

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