Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople and representatives of other Orthodox and Anglican churches accompanied Pope Benedict in lighting a candle to launch the Year of St Paul.
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Volunteers refuse WYD powers
Rural Fire Service and State Emergency Service volunteers will not seek "authorised person" status while assisting with WYD in order to avoid "negative interactions with people".
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Vietnam up, US down on WYD numbers
A record number of Vietnamese pilgrims will attend World Youth Day this year but US numbers are down - and 50 Angola pilgrims are stranded in Sydney instead of Adelaide because tour organisers thought the SA capital was only an hour way.
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Celebrate the living spirit: Bishops urge
Australia's bishops have urged Catholics to "celebrate the Living Spirit" to mark Aboriginal and Torres Islander Sunday this weekend.
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Korean priests in Mass protest against US beef
Two hundred South Korean priests have celebrated a street Mass in Seoul to protest an unpopular government decision to resume beef imports from the US.
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Bees for Benedict
Italian scooter manufacturer Piaggio has presented Pope Benedict with two new specially made three wheeled vehicles.
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Feature - Walking away from what they do not know
"People who leave the Church are not leaving because they are rejecting the teachings of John Paul II or Pope Benedict. Most do so because they go to Catholic schools and they think that the kind of warm secular humanism with Christian gloss that they get in Catholic schools is in fact the Catholic faith and it hasn't captured their imagination, their love or their intellect so they are walking away from something that they do not know." - The Catholic Herald
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Featured Website - First Things
First Things is a monthly ecumenical journal concerned with the creation of a "religiously informed public philosophy for the ordering of society." It is published by The Institute on Religion and Public Life in the United States of America.
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Film Review - Kung Fu Panda
Kung Fu Panda is essentially a martial arts comedy and is a total action movie. It has striking effects and action sequences and a particularly impressive concluding fantasy sequence which brings DreamWorks to a new level of technological sophistication. There is a strong cultural feel about the movie and it heavily draws on Chinese culture to bring authenticity to its fantasy. - Peter Sheehan, Australian Catholic Office for Film and Broadcasting
[More]
Opinion - God is without circumference
His challenge was to see the beauty in every face, even when the owner of that face had long given up on it. Surely, that is to love others as Jesus did—Jesus the One who never gives up on us. If we are to love as Jesus loved, we need to be forgiving people. Forgiving people are bridge-builders and reconcilers. - Fr Chris Gleeson, Madonna
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OPINION
Beyond knowledge to wisdomI believe this is one of the crisis points for contemporary Christianity. Put bluntly, its representatives do not seem wise. Yes, those representatives can give you any amount of information, some of them can even speak knowledgeably of Christian teachings. Wisdom is another thing altogether. - Fr Michael Whelan [More] - Aquinas Academy
FEATURE
Connected across bordersIt is time for leaders of nations to see their national interests as connected with the interests of people on the other side of the globe. We have reached the point where human existence is at stake and our destiny is inextricably linked. If we are to overcome this crisis of climate change we need to think beyond the confines of national states. - Just Comment [More] - Edmund Rice Centre
FEATURED CATHOLIC WEBSITE
Catholic Education Diocese of ParramattaReturning to our education theme, we shine the spotlight on arguably the most innovative Catholic education website in the country. In addition to all the standard features of any CEO site, Parramatta's includes some interactive opinion polls and a competition for students to attempt to ''Become the Executive Director for the day''. The site is also well regarded for its RE and curriculum resources.
- www.parra.catholic.edu.au
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15 years added to pedophile priest's jail sentence
Former Melbourne priest Michael Charles Glennon will spend at least 15 more years behind bars after County Court judge Roland Williams set the minimum sentence yesterday for a string of fresh sex offences against him.
Judge Williams sentenced the 59-year-old to a maximum of 18 years on 26 counts against four young victims. But the judge said the new maximum sentence from yesterday would in fact become 20 years, with two years added on from the sentence he is currently serving.
Glennon has spent most of the past 13 years in jail. He has been convicted of sexually abusing 15 children between 1974 and 1991, mostly at youth camps held at Karaglen, a rural property near Lancefield north of Melbourne, which Glennon helped establish and operate.
The most recent trial heard that Glennon told his boy victims that the sexual offences were secret men's business and a necessary part of their initiation into Aboriginal manhood. Judge Williams sid he believed that Glennon was one of a small number of offenders who were "just wantonly evil".
He had shown himself to be an "evil, callous human being", a man of cunning and planning who committed the most sordid crimes against his victims.
In other news, the Boston Archdiocese's record $A120 million offer to settle claims of clergy sexual abuse took effect on Monday. Attorneys announced that the required 80% had signed on. More are expected to join by today's deadline.
Under the agreement, a mediator will hear each victim's case and set an award ranging from $A113,000 to $A425,000, depending on the severity, duration and kind of abuse.
Meanwhile in Ireland, frustrated Christian Brothers have claimed they will not get a fair hearing at the Child Abuse Commission after the High Court threw out the order’s challenge to the probe. The Brothers said the commission's findings would be "unsafe" following the decision that deceased, infirm or untraceable members will not escape naming and shaming.
The order said it had not decided whether to appeal the judgment to the Supreme Court an option that would create further delays for the troubled inquiry. It said the inability to offer proper defences and the "danger of prejudice" from the lapse of time in older cases would "undoubtedly" render findings unsafe.
"The Christian Brothers regard this as a real threat to human and civil rights in a modern civilised democracy," it said.
SOURCE
15 years' jail for pedophile priest (The Age/AAP)
Most Boston clergy sex abuse victims agree to settle (Catholic News Service)
We won’t get fair hearing, say Brother (Examiner/oneinfour.org)
LINKS
Ex-priest jailed for child sex (AAP/The Age)
Monster pays for evil (Herald-Sun)
Paedophile priest facing long jail term (ABC)
Ex-priest jailed for child sex crimes (AAP/ninemsn)
Outcry against "sex monster" priest (13/10/03)
Sensitive task of putting a price tag on sex abuse (Christian Science Monitor)
23 Oct 2003
