The Record Newspaper 16 December 2004

The Salvatorian Fathers have opened a novitiate in Perth and have two young men beginning a 7-year journey to the priesthood.

The young novices are Phillip Vostan (20), of Beckenham, and Michael Cornell (18), of Sydney.

The novitiate was formally opened and the novices received during Mass at St Anthony’s Church, Greenmount, on December 7, the vigil of the feast of the Immaculate Conception.

The novitiate is located in St Anthony’s Parish in a house provided free of charge by Archbishop Barry Hickey. It is the first formation house established by the Salvatorians since their arrival in Australia in 1961 and will be the national centre for vocations training.

Archbishop Hickey said that the opening of the novitiate was a great event for the Order and for the Archdiocese.

“At a time when many religious orders are struggling to attract vocations, it is wonderful to see a young, vigorous community taking this step,” he said.

“Opening a novitiate with two young men is an expression of confidence in the future, a confidence we should all share.”

The Novice Master will be Fr Chris Kowalczyk who first came to WA 15 years ago, but has since had assignments in other parts of the world.

Tuesday night’s celebrations also saw 22 Salvatorian priests from WA and NSW make their annual renewal of vows of poverty, celibate chastity and obedience. The feast of the Immaculate Conception is the anniversary of the foundation of the Society of the Divine Saviour in 1881.

Michael Cornell was the first of the two novices to join the Salvatorians. He is from the Sydney Cathedral parish, but his grandmother is the sacristan in a neighbouring parish and it was there that Michael met Fr Dariusz Basiaga SDS.

He said that in many long con-

versations, Fr Dariusz taught him a lot about prayer and faith and inspired him with the idea of joining the Salvatorians.

He completed his secondary studies in Sydney, joined the Order on his 18th birthday and has spent nine months in Perth as a postulant.

Phillip Vostan became a Catholic two years ago when he began to look into his Croatian background and discovered the rich Catholic tradition in Croatia.

He said the thought of the priesthood was with him from the beginning, but his attraction to the Salvatorians was triggered by a CD put out by Fr Irek Czech SDS. He began his postulancy six months ago.

After completing 12 months of formation in the novitiate, the two will be eligible for their first vows in the Order and will then begin six years of study and formation leading to ordination.

St Anthony’s Church was

packed for the occasion, with many young people present to congratulate Michael and Phillip. Included in the congregation were people from five of the WA parishes served by the Salvatorians (Greenmount, Balcatta, Ocean Reef, Merredin and Bruce Rock) and representatives of the Missionaries of Charity, the Schoenstatt Sisters and the Redemptorists, and several diocesan priests.

Clergy on the move

Archbishop Barry Hickey has announced 19 changes in Clergy appointments throughout the Archdiocese. Most of the new appointments will take effect at the end of January. The changes involve city and country parishes from the Cathedral to Kalgoorlie.

The changes are:

■ Fr Greg Donovan, currently at Mt Lawley, has been appointed Parish Priest of John Paul Parish, Willetton. The appointment begins on 30 January 2005.

■ Fr Gerard Beeson, currently at Mirrabooka, has been appointed Parish Priest of Our Lady of Mt Carmel, Hilton. The appointment takes effect at the beginning of February 2005, after the departure of the Carmelite Fathers from Hilton Parish.

■ Fr Kazimierz Stuglik has been appointed Parish Priest of St Francis Xavier Parish, Armadale, to take effect from 29 January 2004.

■ Fr Terry Nueva, formerly of Armadale will be Parish Priest of Corrigin, Kulin, Kondinin and Hyden from 29 January 2004. He has expressed a desire to serve in the country.

■ Fr Valerio Fenoglio CRS will be appointed Parish Priest of St Jerome's Parish, Spearwood, on Sunday 19 December 2004. Fr Valerio belongs to the Somascan

Continued on page 5

Resurrection

A youth movement that develops the leadership capacity of young people according to Christian principles has arisen again in Perth.

The enthusiasm and vibrant nature of more than 25 young people in Perth has now contributed to one of the strongest YCW movements in Australia.

The movement was started by Cardinal Joseph Cardijn, from Belgium and is run for youth, by youth aged between 18 and 30. Its primary aim is to remain active in addressing major issues affecting young people in the workforce and community.

The Cardinal grew up in a mining town in Belgium in the 1920’s and after becoming a priest, he returned to his hometown where he saw the mundane reality of the people and that they had no time for practising religion, family, leisure, or building a sense of community.

He began walking with them on their way to work every day,

encouraging them to share their experiences of work and home.

It was through these conversations with the workers that the Cardinal developed the ‘see, judge, act’ method as a way for them to discover the meaning of their life.

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Former Perth YCW member and newly appointed National Secretary Sara Kane said the movement still follows the same method.

“This method enables young people to analyse what is happening in their lives with their friends and family, in their local community and in society,” she said.

“It isn’t confronting and has proven to be a good way to get to know a young person,”

“We look at home situations, the wider community and how we are part of the problem.”

YCW is also present in five other states.

Adelaide works with refugees, Sydney with unemployment issues, Brisbane with ‘smart casual’ education programs and Canberra with a Women’s review group.

Melbourne is also in the process of re-starting.

Ms Kane says the Perth focus is quite different to the other cities.

“The Perth YCW are exploring the issues and potential action areas in workplace and education,” she said.

“We are trying to empower young people by providing them with the essential skills that young people need to survive in the community, workplace and in their own personal relationships.”

Ms Kane mentioned that internationally, YCW is on the same level of focus and commitment.

“We are taking a look at the real situation that young people are experiencing everyday,”

“By taking action both personally and in a collective sense through personal action and campaigns,

young people experience a double transformation – of themselves and the community around them.”

Ms Kane went on to say that in particular Perth YCW are a friendly, diverse and vibrant community of young people, committed to bringing about positive change and justice within the ordinary circumstances of everyday life.

“There is also much support from ex-members and also the clergy, such as Fr Corran Pike, from Willetton parish,” Ms Kane said.

Fr Pike, who is the YCW Chaplain for Willetton Parish, said the movement has a lot to offer young people in the world today.

“Through YCW they are able to see what’s going on in the world, judge the situations in light of the gospel and act on that,” he said.

Fr Pike believes that YCW is a necessary way of formation for young people that gives them the tools they need in the workplace and in their own life.

“To critically reflect on what’s happening and to act in accordance with the gospel and Christian values is the key to real freedom,” he said.

“I have seen that YCW acts as a help for them to make definite and real changes in their lives and the lives of other people.”

More recently, Perth held its annual Diocesan Council at New Norcia where delegates participated in a number of training and formation workshops such as communication skills, conflict-resolution skills, spirituality, YCW theology and leadership skills.

Most recently, a new team of

delegates was elected to oversee and direct the work and development of YCW in Perth.

In addition to the Perth Diocesan council, members for the Perth YCW participated in the Australian YCW National Council in Sydney and the International Council in Venezuela.

The Sydney Council was also attended by Fr Augustine Pon from Hong Kong who is the Chaplain for the Asia-Pacific region and Bishop Justin Bianchini, of Geraldton who is spokesman of the Australian Bishops committee for the Laity.

Ms Kane said the National Council was a time where delegates were able to develop a national plan of action responding directly to the reality experienced by young people.

“The Australian YCW has been representing and serving young people’s needs in the areas of employment, refugees, community building and the workplace for the past two years,” she said.

“The participation from young workers in Europe, Africa, the Americas and the Asia-Pacific region strengthened their commitment to put an end to the uncertainty caused by unemployment and informal and temporary work, and helped to build a better life for young people internationally,” said Ms Kane.

For more information on any of the Perth YCW events or campaigns, contact Perth YCW worker Kate Maassen on 9422 7910, or email ycw@highgate-perthcatholic. org.au

Faith shines from one to another

When twenty six year old Michael Barker was baptised into the Catholic Church on November 20 this year the woman who had journeyed with him during his recent battle with cancer was once again standing faithfully by his side.

Nadine Laurent was Michael’s sponsor as he received the Sacraments of Baptism, Communion and Confirmation at the Queen of Apostles Church in Riverton and the couple will soon add the Sacrament of Marriage to that list.

Michael and Nadine first met during a Statistics lecture at Curtin University in 1997 when she told him to “Shut up!” Quite a contrast he acknowledges with a laugh, to the “I do” that will pass through those same lips as they marry in Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Mauritius on January 12 next year.

Michael has appreciated the opportunity to choose his own spiritual home.

His parents, being non-practising Christians, had decided with each of their three sons, that they would not initiate them into a church, but would rather allow them to choose for themselves later in life. Until he met Nadine, Michael had accepted that God must exist, but there had never

been any personal understanding or direction that went with this belief. Once his relationship with Nadine began to improve (after that initial hiccup!) they began dating and he became increasingly aware of her unique inner quali-

ties. She was always seeing the good in others whereas the world around seemed to constantly focus on the negative. He came to realise that this attraction extended to her family and he attributed it to their Catholic

Lombadina visits Perth

Students from Djarindjin Lombadina Catholic School described their recent trip to Perth as awesome. The Perth Life Skills Transition Program focussed on providing the Middle School (Year 6/7) students with an insight into post-primary schooling options.

The program also entailed meeting with Aboriginal role models and learning valuable life skills such as how to catch a train, managing spending money and adjusting to a cooler climate. The students visited Trinity,

Aranmore and Clontarf Colleges and Curtin University as well as undertaking educational visits at AQWA, the Western Australian Museum, Scitech, the Maritime Museum and Fremantle Prison.

The group of seven students, accompanied by teacher Shendelle Mullane, teacher-assistant Nathan Sampi and parent Jillian Hunter also enjoyed a sleepover at Perth Zoo. Some city shopping and entertainment time such as Timezone and Adventure World were also squeezed into the program, along

with the obligatory Kentucky Fried Chicken, McDonalds and Sizzlers Restaurant visits.

Ms Mullane said the students responded brilliantly to all the challenges of the itinerary and were a credit to their school and community.

“The help of teacher-assistant Nathan Sampi and parent Jillian Hunter was invaluable,” she said.

“They were both integral to the success of the Perth visit.

“We were very fortunate to gain VEGAS funding to offset the travel and accommodation costs. The

faith and their relationship with God. He recognised within Nadine something that he suspected could fill the emptiness he was beginning to identify in himself.

So gradually he started to attend Mass with her and then earlier this year began to receive instruction in the Faith from Fr John Flynn at the Riverton Parish. He soon came to realize all the misconceptions he had about Catholicism and began understanding the Scriptures and the Church’s teachings in a new light.

The nurturing of Fr. Flynn, who shared both his spiritual and practical wisdom, also inspired him. So it was on this spiritual foundation that he was able to confront the cancer that was diagnosed in August this year.

Although over the next few months he slipped into depression on several occasions, he never ceased praying and was surprised at the positive attitude that he was generally able to maintain. He received great support from his family and friends.

He and Nadine would pray at the Cathedral before appointments at Royal Perth Hospital, especially before the actual operation and follow up chemotherapy. He firmly believes that these prayers eased the physical pain.

He then surprised himself when his prayers began to extend beyond his personal needs to those of Nadine should his treatment not be successful. He also acknowledges the strength he received knowing that the Church was behind him as Fr Flynn supported him with prayers and phone calls.

Michael recognises the contrast of his decision to turn to God and those of his parents who had turned away when they had faced crossroads in their lives.

Before Michael was born his father had been involved in a serious motorcycle accident that left him with permanent physical injuries.

His faith had never recovered from this incident. Michael’s mother also turned away from her own spiritual origins when her brother died from a brain tumour when he was in his twenties.

She lost her faith because she did not believe that God would allow something like this to happen to such a young person.

Michael on the other hand has embraced his new-found faith. And with no trace of cancer to be found, his family relationships strengthened through his illness and faith, and the impending marriage to Nadine, he has no intention of letting go!

One

Religion benefits society

A new research reportSpirituality and Wellbeing in Australia - suggests that the drift towards a more secular mindset among Australians is no Christmas gift for community wellbeing.

Dr Peter Kaldor, the report's principal author, said the results suggest that, in some important areas, those with a more secular outlook have lower levels of wellbeing than those with a spiritual orientation.

"Those with a spiritual orientation tend to score higher on many of the wellbeing measures included in the study. They tend to have a greater sense of purpose in life, a greater openness to personal growth, and more optimism about life", he said.

"Of significance, the research also suggests that those with a spiritual orientation are more likely to contribute to others, whether informally in daily life, giving money to charities or doing voluntary service with community groups. These results suggest that exploration of

spirituality and wellbeing may be important to a healthy society."

The research is based on the 2002-03 Wellbeing and Security Study, undertaken by researchers from Edith Cowan University and Deakin University in conjunction with National Christian Life Survey Research and ANGLICARE (Sydney). It is designed to examine the nature and levels of security in Australian society, and its relationship with wellbeing.

Dr John Bellamy, ANGLICARE's researcher on the study, said some writers have assumed that a more secular outlook on life would be positive for society. "While no doubt a complex question, the opposite appears to be true: religion and spirituality appear to provide some anchors for life."

The study also examines wellbeing among people with different spiritual orientations.

"Alternative spiritualities and a Christian religious orientation have different relationships with wellbeing", said Dr Kaldor. "While

Fr Gatt's Christmas lifeline on the go

Fr Michael Gatt is will be running his 24-hour seven days a week help line again this Christmas.

Fr Gatt heads a team of six volunteers to offer assistance for people who are suicidal, alone or in despair.

“The festive season is fine if you’re happy, if you have a good home and you are safe,” Fr Gatt said.

“But for many people this is not true.”

Last season, more than 100 calls were received with some continuing until March.

Fr Gatt said the aim of the help line is to provide a confidential service at what is usually a stressful time for people and when other agencies are closed.

Calls to the help line can be anonymous, are non-judgemental and confidential.

Many people have also rung to offer assistance. Fr Gatt said that last year he had a call from a lady in Spearwood who came to Mass and saw Fr Gatt but remained anonymous. This is the 13th year the service has been running with the assistance of social workers, doctors and lawyers.

Volunteers are also able to make personal home visits when

both are linked to a positive sense of purpose in life, those with a religious orientation tend to have a greater sense of purpose than those involved in alternative spiritualities. Those involved in alternative spiritualities are less likely to contribute to charities or to community groups than people with a religious orientation."

Dr Kaldor believes that this may be due to the more eclectic nature of much alternative spiritual searching that does not provide as clear a framework for living.

"It is also possible that people who are unable to embrace religious beliefs are more likely to explore alternative spiritualities", Dr Kaldor said.

The study found that pursuing alternative spiritualities appears to be more strongly related to a sense of personal growth than does a religious orientation.

The study also identifies a concern in relation to religious orientation. Compared to other religious people, the unreflectively religious

tend to have lower levels of selfesteem, lower levels of personal growth, and are less involved in voluntary service, giving to charities or informal acts of service.

The lower levels of wellbeing among people with a secular mindset suggest that many Australians are not finding the wellbeing they aspire to. Why, with widespread affluence, are Australians no happier than previously?

Dr Kaldor said "Part of the answer may lie in the lack of importance placed on the spiritual in our society. While many things can affect our sense of wellbeing, the study does raise questions about the role of spirituality in this.”

Dr Bellamy said "The results of the research suggest that with the decline of the significance of church life in Australia and the secularisation of Christian festivals such as Christmas, we are losing something of the fabric of community wellbeing.”

The study - a random sample

survey of 1514 Australian adults - contains a range of health and wellbeing measures and measures of spiritual beliefs and practices. The measures include:

■ General health and physical functioning

■ Mental health

■ Self esteem, optimism, sense of control, purpose in life and sense of personal growth

■ Satisfaction with life

■ Sense of security

■ Relational wellbeing

■ Concern for others

Dr Bellamy said the research also has a message for charities this Christmas.

"The research should motivate the many church-based charities, as they focus on helping the needy this Christmas, not to lose sight of their core beliefs. The research shows that people who are practising Christians are more likely than most other Australians to support charities."

Golden Jubilee celebrations for priests

There was an air of celebration and thanksgiving in South Perth last month.

Parish Priest Father Michael Casey celebrated his golden jubilee of priesthood with a special Mass at St Columba's Church followed by a supper at the South Perth Civic Centre.

Archbishop Hickey and Bishop Sproxton presided at the Mass with several other priests who had worked closely with Fr Casey in his many projects, and his Monday lunch companions, Fr Brian Harris and Fr Simon Carson.

required or seek the help of other services.

The service started in 1991 when Fr Gatt was Parish Priest of Manning and wanted to start up a group for single people.

When the idea of the help line was developed, Fr Gatt said he was very pleased.

“The task has been very rewarding and I have come into contact with people I never thought possible,” he said.

Fr Gatt said the biggest number of callers were people who were lonely because of family breakups. Last year seven callers were suicidal.

However, there has also been an increase in the number of people becoming distressed by their financial situation during the festive season.

Fr Gatt also mentioned that the help line is not simply a sympathetic ear.

“If someone rings to say they have run out of petrol and can’t afford any fuel, we talk to the petrol station,” he said.

“If they don’t have enough food, we can send a food parcel immediately.”

The help line can be contacted on 9444 1334 and 9444 8650.

The church was packed with parishioners and friends of Fr Casey including some who had travelled from his former parish of Merredin.

Father Casey's sister, lta Furlong, was also present, representing family from Ireland and other parts of the world.

Archbishop Hickey thanked Father Casey for his dedication and priestly service to the people during the past 50 years.

“Father Casey is a pastoral man who has taken his obligations as priest and pastor very seriously,” the Archbishop said.

“Wherever he has been in the Diocese, he is known for his pastoral care and concern for the people, in particular at

Merredin and South Perth.” The Archbishop also acknowledged Father Casey for his special care for priests, and in particular for in his care of Father John Leech over many years.

“Father Casey has laboured day and night for the spiritual good of the people,” the Archbishop said.

During his time in Merredin, Fr Casey established facilities to care for travellers providing shelter and special help when possible.

“Father Casey responded personally to the need of these people by organising a facility in the community, one which is still

Fr Whitley gives 50 years

Family and friends gathered at St Joseph’s Church Subiaco last week to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Fr Barry Whitley.

After training at St Charles in Guilford, Fr Whitley was ordained in Rome in 1954 and is responsible for bringing the Right

of Christian Initiation for Adults to Perth nearly 15 years ago. During his life he has also served as Parish Priest of Hammersley and more recently at St Jerome’s Spearwood until late last year. He now stays at St John of God Villa in Subiaco..

offering help to travellers,” the Archbishop said. “His compassion for the poor was always very evident.”

After his ordination in June 1954, Father Casey came to Western Australia that same year and was appointed as Assistant Parish Priest in Mosman Park.

In 1956 he was transferred to Holy Rosary Parish in Nedlands where he served for 10 years as assistant priest and later as administrator.

In 1966 he was appointed to St. Mary's Merredin as Parish Priest where he stayed until 1979.

St Columba’s parishioner Pat Brown also spoke about Father Casey's concern for the poor.

“It has always been a driving force in his ministry since he was appointed parish priest of South Perth,” she said,

One part of his work with the poor over the years has involved establishing a fund for the destitute, which is now contributed to by parishioners and friends annually.

Father Casey said his greatest influences during his lifetime are his parishioners and his parents.

“I have been inspired by the great dedication of so many to their faith,” he said.

Cursillo a guide to richer life

Perth can expect great things with the comeback of the Catholic Cursillo movement.

The movement presents ways of living as a Christian in today’s society by which a deeper relationship with God may be developed.

“All you need is a wish or desire for a richer Christian life within the Church,” said National Co-ordinator Merran Martin.

Mrs Martin has been involved in the movement for the past 18 years because of her friends involvement with Cursillo showed her that it would meet her desire to deepen her faith.

Cursillo was originally founded in Spain by Eduardo Bonnin in the 1940’s and means short course in Spanish.

It was first reported to be in Australia in the Spanish community in New South Wales in the early 1960’s.

The Cursillo movement was formed in response to a volatile and changing world.

Mrs Martin said it is important to remember that it is only one such response and not the only one.

During the time before Cursillo came about, Spain was predominately Catholic and the Spanish Civil War from 1936 – 1939 could be said to have been fought between religious Catholics and political Catholics.

After the war, there was a need for healing and apostolic direction.

In 1941 there was an extensive reorganisation of the method

of Spanish Catholic Action. This led towards preparations for the great pilgrimage to the shrine of St James the Apostle at Santiago de Compostela with more than 10,000 young men and women.

It was believed that this would be the best way to achieve the much needed healing and apostolic direction. Groups of young leaders from all over Spain were trained to organise and conduct this pilgrimage.

The pilgrimage was postponed a number of times because of World War II, but small groups of the pilgrimage leaders continued short courses – hence Cursillos - in order to maintain their training.

Today, the movement offers a

method by which an individual’s relationship with God may be developed, deepened and lived out with other Christians.

The movement is not an organisation and people are free to come and go as they choose.

It does not exist in order to rule over members or pursue a cause and is under the direction of the local Bishop.

After the Catholic movement came to Australia in 1965, it was active in Western Australia until the 1990’s.

Since then it has been active only amongst the Vietnamese Community in Westminster, where there have been about 50 Cursillistas for the past seven years.

President of the Vietnamese Cursillo Peter Pham came to the movement four years ago after being told about it by a friend.

Prior to becoming a Cursillista, Mr Pham was a regular churchgoer, but not actively involved in the Church.

“It has changed the way I look at the Church, the way I live as a Christian, and the way I approach life,” Mr Pham said.

Involvement with Cursillo starts with a three-day retreat, led predominantly by lay people with the support of a priest.

The experience is built on a structured program of short talks as well as discussions, liturgy, music and other activities.

In short, Cursillo identifies what is fundamental to Christian living.

Its purpose is to Christianise environments by building Christian life in people.

“It is most important to place Cursillistas back into the environment from which they came,” Mrs Martin said.

After getting married in 1999, Andrew Booth, a building inspector, became a Catholic after attending the RCIA program.

He had attended a number of other courses, including ALPHA, and had heard of Cursillo through his mother-in-law, and seen the changes it had made in her life.

In 2002 he decided to attend a Cursillo course run by the Anglican Church and was later invited to join a team that organised Cursillo events.

However, Mr Booth began wondering why it wasn’t in the Catholic Church here in Western Australia.

It was through a chance conversation with a lady who knew his wife that he was able to come into contact with National Secretary Merran Martin.

Since that moment, he says, he has been able to develop a deeper relationship with people, particularly at work. “People are generally looking for something more personal,” said Mr Booth.

Mr Booth says that he is always ready to tell people about Cursillo, and carries brochures in his car, just in case.

Two weekends have been held in the last few weeks in Perth.

Pope John Paul II has urged Cursillistas to keep Church unity at the forefront of their efforts to make Christ known to the men and women of the 21st Century.

“Many men and women of our time, who unfortunately distance themselves from God, await from you the light of faith which would also make them rediscover the colours of existence and the joy of feeling loved by God,” the Pope said at an address to members of the movement last year.

The Pope also said the Second Vatican Council deepened the Church’s awareness of its mission to real people and not just abstractions.

“Christianity cannot be reduced to doctrine, nor to simple principles, because Christ, the centre of Christianity, is alive and his presence is the event,” he said.

Interested persons can contact Andrew Booth on 9364 9567.

Continued from page 1

Order which intends to make a Religious Foundation in this Archdiocese.

■ Fr Abraham Martin-Rodriguez has been appointed Priest-in-Charge of St Gerard's, Mirrabooka till a new Parish Priest is appointed.

■ Fr Phong Nguyen, currently Priestin-Charge at Willetton, has been appointed Associate Pastor of St Mary's Parish, Kalgoorlie, with a view to becoming Parish Priest in due course.

■ Parish Priest, Fr Tony Vallis will be offered another appointment after the completion of the new Boulder Church.

■ Fr Francis Huy, currently Assistant in Kalgoorlie, will take up his new appointment as Priest-in-Charge of Bencubbin Parish from 30 January 2005.

■ Fr Corran Pike, currently Assistant at Willetton, will take up his new appointment as Priest-in-Charge of St Paul's Parish, Mt Lawley from 30 January 2005. He will have the opportunity to complete his Masters Thesis in Theology at Notre Dame University.

■ Fr Sagay Arokyiadoss of Bencubbin will be released after Christmas to be part of an Itinerant Neo-Catechumenate Missionary Team.

■ Fr John Arulraj, at present in Spearwood, will care for the Parish of St Brigid's, Midland from 29 January 2004. I seek expressions of interest in this Parish.

■ Fr Dat Vuong will serve as Assistant Priest in the Parish of Sts John and Paul, Willetton from 29 January 2005 after two years as Assistant in Bateman.

■ Fr Thai Vu has been appointed Assistant

Priest in the Parish of St Thomas More, Bateman from 29 January 2005

■ Fr Miguel Zavarese has been appointed Assistant Priest at St Mary's Cathedral where he exercised his Diaconate ministry.

■ Fr Vittorio Ricciardi has been appointed Assistant Priest at the Parish of the Good Shepherd, Lockridge from 29 January 2005.

The Salvatorian Fathers have proposed the following changes which I

have approved.

■ Fr Mariusz Adamcyzk SDS of Merredin has been transferred to the Parish of Pymble - Diocese of Broken Bay. I thank him as I do all the Salvatorian Fathers for their great contribution to the Archdiocese.

■ Fr Karol Kulczycki SDS is to become Parish Priest of Greenmount from 23 January 2005.

■ Fr Stanislaw Bendkowski SDS is to

become Parish Priest of Merredin from 23 January 2005.

■ Fr Christopher Kowalczyk SDS is to become part-time Assistant Priest in Greenmount Parish from 23 January 2005, as well as Novice master at the Salvatorians' new House of Formation in Greenmount.

■ Fr Dariusz Basiaga SDS is to be Assistant Priest in Balcatta Parish from 23 January 2005.

Guest Editorial

Greek author, Luke, today gives us his thoughts on why the world becomes a better place and people renew their faith in goodness about this time each year.

The angel Gabriel was sent from God to a town of Galilee named Nazareth to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary.

Upon arriving, the angel said to her: “Rejoice, O highly favoured daughter! The Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women.”

She was deeply troubled by his words, and wondered what his greeting meant.

The angel went on to say to her: “Do not fear, Mary. You have found favour with God. You shall conceive and bear a son and give him the name of Jesus. Great will be his dignity and he will be called Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of David his father. He will rule over the house of Jacob forever and his reign will be without end.

Mary said to the angel, “How can this be since I do not know man?”

The angel answered her: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; hence the holy offspring to be born will be called Son of God. Know that Elizabeth your kinswoman has conceived a son in her old age; she who was thought to be sterile is now in her sixth month, for nothing is impossible with God.”

PO Box 75, Leederville, WA 6902

Tel: (08) 9227 7080, Fax: (08) 9227 7087 cathrec@iinet.net.au

Mary said: “I am the servant of the Lord. Let it be done to me as you say.”

With that, the angel left her.

Thereupon, Mary set out, proceeding in haste into the hill country to a town of Judah where she entered Zechariah’s house and greeted Elizabeth.

When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leapt in her womb. Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and cried out in a loud voice: “Blest are you among women and blest is the fruit of your womb. But who am I that the mother of my Lord should come to me? The moment your greeting sounded in my ears, the baby leapt in my womb for joy. Blest is she who trusted that the Lord’s words to her would be fulfilled.”

Mary remained with Elizabeth about three months and then returned home. (Elizabeth gave birth to a son whom she named John,)

Caesar Augustus published a decree ordering a census of the whole world. This first census took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria. Everyone went to register, each to his own town.

And so Joseph went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to David’s town of Bethlehem - because he was of the house and lineage of David – to register with Mary, his espoused wife, who was with child.

While they were there the days of her confinement were completed. She gave birth to her first-born son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the place where travellers lodged.

There were shepherds in that region, living in the fields and keeping night watch by turns over their flocks. The angel of the Lord appeared to them as the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were very much afraid.

The angel said to them: “You have nothing to fear! I come to proclaim good news to you – tidings of great joy to be shared by the whole people. This day in David’s city a saviour has been born to you, the Messiah and Lord. Let this be a sign to you: in a manger you will find an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes.”

Suddenly, there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in high heave, peace on earth to those on whom his favour rests.”

When the angles had returned to heaven. The shepherds said to one another: “Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this event which the Lord has made known to us.”

They went in haste and found Mary and Joseph and the baby lying in the manger; once they saw they understood what had been told them concerning this child. All who heard of it were astonished at the report given them by the shepherds.

Mary treasured all these things and reflected on them in her heart.

The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, in accord with what had been told them.

- Taken from The New American Bible.

letters to the editor

THE PAOMNNEHAL PWEOR OF THE HMUAN MNID

Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Amzanig huh?

Peace deserves a real debate

The Dutch bishops were reported as saying that “Islam preaches only peace” (Record, 25/11) after Van Gogh, a provocative film-maker, was murdered, presumably on religious grounds. Nobody seems to have contradicted the Dutch bishops, who are just plain wrong.

Cardinal George Pell, who in a recent US speech likened the appeal of Islam to some restless Westerners to that which Communism used to enjoy in past decades, was promptly contradicted in his own diocese by a Church organisation led by a Sister.

So it would seem that the discussion about the challenge of resurgent Islam is going to be muddled by those who won’t take the trouble to look at the source documents, and read some history.

The Record recently published an excellent discussion on Paul Gray’s 2004 book Nightmare of the Prophet. Fortunately the reviewer Hal Colebatch had more idea of Islam than Mr Gray, so readers had a chance to realise the challenge civilisation is facing.

It would seem that Catholics who want to hide their heads in the sand, and others who want to believe the best of everybody, will refuse to look at the source books, and continue with happy thoughts about the force that past Christians had succeeded in driving out of most of Europe.

For those who doubt the critics, get a good encyclopaedia and look up the word “Janissary. “In past centuries Muslim armies would enslave conquered men and women, and take the children away to be brought up as Muslim soldiers. When they reached a certain age, the Janissaries were sent into battle against their Christian relatives, full of determination to kill or convert them.

Finding that the scriptures of Islam say that enemies ought to be crucified and suffer other grisly fates is scarcely believable to anyone who imagines that rows and rows of men (note, men) bowing their foreheads to the ground shows great piety and devotion to the Deity.

If the present State Government gets its way, anyone who dares to point out the inadequacies of other faiths will be put through

an anti-vilification court and fined a large amount, or gaoled. Religious freedom, like free speech, is being whittled away, while the “do-gooders” think they are smoothing matters by not facing the unpleasant aspects of some of the other inhabitants of the world.

However, critics of Islam must not fall into the trap of blindly ignoring all the unjust anti-Muslim acts that governments are performing. Hindu India’s grab for Muslim Kashmir, KGB-ruled Russia’s refusal to liberate the Muslim Chechnya colony, and Jewish Israel’s refusal to grant half of Palestine back to its inhabitants, are just some of the injustices that people like myself object to.

And I object to the weapons manufacturers who keep on producing unnecessary guns, rocket launchers, bombs, aircraft, nuclear items, selling them to anyone, and I mean anyone, who can pay. Much misery in many parts of the world is caused by these people without a conscience.

And the torture by coalition forces at Abu Ghraib, in Iraq, and the illegal holding of Muslims in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is adding more to the hate that Muslims will feel for the rest of humanity.

Politicians are not logical

After listening to the Politicians holding forth about the future “crisis” of our ageing population, and warning that drastic measures will have to be implemented, I venture to suggest that an obvious first step would be to cease pouring millions of present taxpayers dollars into funding the killing of future generations. This could well serve to curtail the activities of the money-making abortion clinics and moderate the use of the liberal abortion laws of this ‘lucky’ country.

Being concerned about where future generations of taxpayers are to be found while providing means to make it easy to kill them, seems to be the height of illogicality. To add to this almost incredible scenario,

the Government is now using taxpayers’ dollars to pay (bribe) women to have babies, regardless of their financial means.

As Phillip Longman writes in his book “The Empty Cradle,”...”Social Security systems depend on growing numbers of taxpayers, to finance welfare for each retiring generation.” Many women may decide to keep their child if the whole process was not made so easy and persuasive. Perhaps we should all pray more for them, when they have to make this all-important decision; and for clarity of vision for the lawmakers, unclouded by political expediency.

A Morel North Perth

The answer is in the manger

If lights and parties bring joy to so many,

Why can’t my heart stop crying?

If gifts and family cheer mean I am truly loved,

Why does my soul feel so alone?

I hear the sounds of life

But feel the pain of dying I see the smiles of love

But sadness has gripped my soul.

No where to turn,

No one to trust

No time to change,

Nothing to hope.

Can a baby born in a manger

Make any difference to me?

Can he reach deep into my soul

To heal wounds I cannot even see?

Can he put a new song in my heart

And show me how to live each day?

How to hope again and care

Forgive, serve, and even pray?

A baby born in a manger

Who ever could have known?

Let him take your heart, this Christmas

And you shall never be all alone.

holiday viewing

Even without the spectacle of another Lord of the Rings installment, this Christmas season promises a few cinematic treats.

Deep Blue IN CINEMAS BOXING DAY

Following the success of ‘The Blue Planet’, an extraordinary oceanographic documentary series made for television by the BBC Natural History Unit and Discovery, its composer George Fenton performed some of his score to a live audience with images from the show back-projected onto a screen in the auditorium.

The results proved to be so impressive, and made for such a different viewing experience from the original, that the ‘Blue Planet’ team decided to create a new, feature length version, to be entitled ‘Deep Blue’, which would reveal the wonders of the sea to a film-going audience.

Determined to make the film a separate entity from the TV series, they used an eye-popping widescreen format, perfect both for capturing the expansive grandeur of the oceans and for showing individual organisms in unprecedented detailed close-up.

While the essential elements of Fenton’s soundtrack were

already in place, he rearranged and re-recorded it with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra (their first ever score for cinema), bringing it a new majesty better suited to the big screen.

The comforting tones of David Attenborough, deemed to be too closely associated with television, were replaced by the richer timbres of actor Michael Gambon, while the scientific language of the original here gives way to a far more poetic register, with abstract expressions like “boneless ones”, “night feeders”, “wandering giants” and “lonely traveller in liquid space” regularly substituted for more strictly taxonomical terminology.

So where the TV series sought understanding and appreciation from its viewers, ‘Deep Blue’ seeks rather to fill them with a sense of mouth-gaping awe.

And that it does, be it with the playful dance of the dolphins, the massed flight of albatrosses, the march of a crab army, the swirling vortex of panicked sardines, the majestic passage of a whale shark, the eerie pulsations of jelly fish, a relentless nighthunt by a pack of white-tipped sharks, the rapid rocketing of emperor penguins from ocean onto iceshelf, the desperate arching of beluga whales at a tiny airhole in the ice, the struggle of a baby grey whale against the onslaught of killer whales, a vast gathering of hammerheads, the psychedelic light show displayed by the alien creatures

of the deep, the ‘flight’ of a flock of sheerwaters through water, or the breaching of a giant blue whale.

The film’s sweeping cinematography and magisterial scale are as humbling as they are beautiful, reducing even the most jaded of viewers to wide-eyed submission.

It was inevitable that ‘Deep Blue’ should be compared to Pixar’s animated underwater adventure Finding Nemo - and although the real thing turns out to be far more breathtaking than its computer generated counterpart, one lesson that might have been learnt from the Disney subsidiary is the value of narrative.

For even if there is a vague geographical progression detectable in ‘Deep Blue’ from coastline to coral reef, from polar icecaps to the open sea, and then right into the depths of the ocean floor and back again to the surface, the film is a largely shapeless affair, with no real beginning, middle or end (even if it closes literally with a giant tail disappearing into the brine).

While clearly the story of, say, a meek clownfish’s mission to rescue his son from a dentist’s fishtank would be entirely inappropriate here, the editing (from 7,000 hours of footage) and narration would nonetheless have benefited from a greater sense of direction - something which, after all, the original ‘The Blue Planet’ managed to convey perfectly despite its much greater length.

Chrrisstmas h s hollidday y m moviie e guiide e

The Incredibles

OPENS BOXING DAY

■ By

Aclose-knit clan of superheroes learns that the most fantastic power of all is the love shared by a family in “The Incredibles” (Disney), an animated adventure which, though rip-roaringly entertaining at times, falls short of its title but only slightly.

Directed by Brad Bird, the movie marks the first foray into PG territory by computer-animation powerhouse Pixar, whose recent run of megahits includes “Toy Story,” “Monsters Inc.” and “Finding Nemo.”

Yet while decidedly edgier than those films, “The Incredibles” still packs enough of a Pixar punch to easily leap over its box-office competition in a single bound.

The story centres on Herculean paterfamilias

Bob Parr aka Mr Incredible (he-manly voiced by Craig T Nelson), a masked crime-fighter who, along with his stretchable spouse, Helen aka Elastigirl (voiced by Holly Hunter), hangs up his cape after a slew of lawsuits force him into early retirement.

One ungrateful beneficiary of his heroics complains that by foiling his suicide attempt Mr Incredible didn’t save his life, but rather ruined his death.

To escape further legal action, Bob and Helen agree to enter a comic-book version of the witness protection program and relocate to the suburbs with their three children: superspeedster son Dash (voiced by Spencer Fox), introverted teenage daughter Violet (voiced by Sarah Vowell), who can turn invisible and surround herself with an impenetrable force field, and toddler Jack Jack, who has hasn’t yet exhibited any superpowers.

Bob takes a 9-to-5 job as an insurance salesman. The rest of the family also goes out of its way to appear “normal” (Dash is forbidden to exploit his fleet-footedness to win his track meets).

Helen enjoys being “ordinary,” but Bob misses the rush of his former career. He reminisces about his glory days with fellow retiree Lucius Best aka Frozone (voiced by Samuel L. Jackson), but now all they have to fight is boredom and bulging waistlines.

Bob gets to scratch his itch for action when, unbeknown to Helen, a secret assignment lures him to a remote island and back into the superhero saddle.

First, however, he has to whip his flabby body back into world-saving shape.

Squeezed into his Mr Incredible tights, Bob squares off against the killer robots of new nemesis Syndrome (Jason Lee), an evil genius who wants to rid the world of superheroes, so he can steal the limelight for himself.

Before all is said and done, Helen and the kids join in on the action, leading up to the film’s “Spy Kids”-inspired climax.

Visually, “The Incredibles” is a hyper-frenetic tour de force, though it doesn’t quite match the bar set by “Finding Nemo.”

But that’s not to say that this film isn’t amazing.

Cutting-edge advances in animation technology have made the human characters’ expressions and movements much more fluid and lifelike,

but there are still some wrinkles to iron out. Bird lends his own voice to the show-stealing character of Edna Mode, a pint-sized costume clothier, who assures the Parrs that their new super-duds, in addition to being virtually indestructible, are also machine washable and “breathe like Egyptian cotton.”

Storywise, “The Incredibles” lacks the heart - not to mention the cuddly, easily merchandised finned and fuzzy protagonists of past Pixar productions. Still, the script, also by Bird, is extremely clever and supplies enough eye candy for the kiddies and multilayered dialogue and sharp wit for grownups along for the ride.

Visually, “The Incredibles” is a hyper-frenetic tour de force, though it doesn’t quite match the bar set by “Finding Nemo.”

In fact, in an effort to appeal to older audience members, the film further blurs the line between kids’ and adult entertainment, flirting with more mature themes like midlife anxiety and suspicions of marital infidelity.

into the dialogue.

weapons to countries desperate to pay through the nose “to get respect,” while in another Helen warns the kids that the baddies “will kill you, if they get the chance.”

heads of young viewers, who will probably be more concerned about when the preordained action figures and video game will hit toy-store shelves.

ers that you don’t need a mask and cape to be “super,” urging them to strive for greatness and resist the temptation to settle into complacency.

As Bob laments, “They keep coming back with new ways to celebrate mediocrity.” Luckily, this film is not one of them.

gunplay, a foiled suicide attempt and mature thematic elements, the USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-II - adults and adolescents.

Ocean’s Twelve IN CINEMAS NOW

“Ocean’s Eleven” took in a whopping $183 million at the box office, and its sequel is likely to make off with even more.

The fitfully entertaining caper film “Ocean’s Twelve” (Warner Bros.) has much the same star-studded cast as before: George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Don Cheadle and Bernie Mac. Here, though, they’re joined by Catherine Zeta-Jones as a Europol agent, and the story is set in picturesque European locales Rome, Paris, Amsterdam - rather than Las Vegas.

Since their last heist three and a half years earlier, the larcenous crew has tried to go straight and ring-leader Danny Ocean (Clooney) is living a quiet domestic life with wife Tess (Roberts). But now they must pay back entrepreneur Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia) from whose casino, you’ll recall, they stole $160 million in the first film. The hoped-for quarry here is a Faberge egg housed in a Rome museum, which the team sets out to steal by outwitting master jewel thief Francois Toulour (Vincent Cassel), with Zeta-Jones’ character on their trail.

In addition to the starry leads, there are a couple of unbilled big-name cameos - with Carl Reiner, Elliott Gould and Cherry Jones, who has an especially delicious scene with Damon - adding lustre to the deluxe casting. The principal pleasure of the film is watching all the big names work so amiably together, seeming to have a good time. At one point Roberts gets to impersonate her reallife self, a droll if obvious touch.

Director Steven Soderbergh’s sequel is agreeable rather than grippingly suspenseful, and the script, by George

Nolfi, more genial than truly witty, though there are some mildly surprising twists and turns along the way.

Refreshingly, for an action film, there are no guns and there’s only minimal violence.

Because of tongue-in-cheek glamorisation of robbery and some crude language, the USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III adults.

Ella Enchanted IN CINEMAS NOW

■ By David DiCerto

Set in a fanciful storybook world, “Ella Enchanted” (Miramax) tells the tale of a plucky damsel who, in trying to rid herself of a mysterious curse bestowed on her at birth, discovers that love is the strongest magic of all.

Based on the popular children’s book by Gail Carson Levine and directed by Tommy O’Haver, the film whimsically welds a hip contemporary sensibility to a traditional fairy tale romance with mostly amusing results.

Anne Hathaway, whose past tour on the Cinderella circuit included the lead role in “The Princess Diaries,” sparkles as Ella of Frell, a politically minded young woman more concerned with protesting discrimination against elves and giants than wasting her time pining for some prince charming.

But Ella has one little problem. On the day she was born, Ella was granted the “gift of obedience” by her incompetent (at times inebriated) fairy godmother, Lucinda (Vivica A. Fox).

From that day forward the unlucky beneficiary is unable to refuse any command. This, of course, creates all sorts of trouble for Ella, especially when her wicked stepsisters (Jennifer Higham and Lucy Punch) use her involuntary submissiveness for their own unscrupulous ends.

Aided by a

magic, talking book (Jimi Mistry), Ella sets out on a perilous journey through troll-infested forests in search of the AWOL Lucinda, hoping that she will take back her spell.

Hugh Dancy plays Frell’s future king, Prince Charmont, the charming but clueless royal heartthrob whose eyes are opened to the injustices in his realm by Ella.

Cary Elwes is delightfully devilish as Charmont’s crown-coveting uncle, Edgar, who together with his serpentine sidekick, Heston (voiced by Steve Coogan), plots to rain on Ella and Charmont’s happily-ever-after parade. Rounding out the enchanted ensemble are Aidan McArdle as an elf who wants to be a lawyer, Minnie Driver as a household sprite and Eric Idle as the narrator. Supermodel Heidi Klum plays a giantess, but her performance is as wooden as the hand-cranked escalator in the film’s medieval mall.

As director Tommy O’Haver readily admits, “We’re creating myths here and forming young minds.”

Like past films which mixed fantasy and farce, for example, “The Princess Bride,” “A Knight’s Tale” and “Shrek,” “Ella” follows the standard storybook formula while cleverly updating fairy tale conventions.

Among the movie’s more humorous makebelieve modernisations are yellow-checkered horse-and-carriages, medieval classified pages, benefit dinners for bubonic plague victims and an anti-aging brew called “Bat-tox.”

Together with the recently released “The Prince & Me,” “Ella” is part of a growing trend in Hollywood to over- haul age-old fairy tales in an effort to make them more palatable to contemporary tastes in this

case, giving the story a feminist slant. Light years removed from the damsels-in-distress of old, Ella is a postmodern princess who would just as soon knock a prince off his feet than be swept off her own.

And while it is wholly in keeping with the Church’s teaching concerning the dignity of each person to encourage young girls to develop a healthy sense of self-empowerment, parents should be aware of the views being espoused underneath the film’s breezy fairy tale facade.

In his essay on fairy tales, J.R.R. Tolkien argued that they are not just simplified nursery stories invented to entertain young children but a form of serious literary art which conveys important moral truths.

As director Tommy O’Haver readily admits, “We’re creating myths here and forming young minds.”

During the cleverly conceived opening sequence, the narrator, in true storybook fashion, informs his audience that what follows is a tale about “the perils of choices.”

Unfortunately, the filmmaker has made some choices that would have the Brothers Grimm turning over in their graves.

Once upon a time fairy godmothers didn’t have to sleep off hangovers and “obedience” was not considered a curse.

And while the movie closes on a rather traditional happy note complete with a castle ball - when the fairy dust settles “Ella” may leave a few viewers feeling underenchanted.

Due to some mild crude language and humour, the USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-II - adults and adolescents.

Vista OPINION REFLECTION

dear padre

Question: The current media focus on Islam gives us many scenes of Muslims praying together every day, five times a day – not just once a week as Christians do. Why don’t we Christians have more frequent worship together?

In those immortal words of Prime Minister John Howard: “Hello!

Hello!” But seriously, Catholic Christians do have frequent opportunities of worship together, and always have.

The first Christians in Jerusalem worshipped together daily: “They wentasabodytotheTempleevery day, but met in their houses for the breaking of bread (the Eucharist).”

(Acts 2:46) Thus began the custom of daily Mass, maintained to this day in Catholic churches around the world – including your own parish.

But even if they didn’t have access to the Temple in Jerusalem, the first Christians – who still considered themselves Jews – would have continued the Jewish practice of daily prayer. This meant morning and evening prayers, prayers before meals, and at other times. “Seven times daily I praise You, Lord, for Your righteous rulings.”

(Psalm 119:164)

These seven times or “hours” of prayer developed over the centu-

diversity matters

ries into what we know today as “the Liturgy of the Hours”. These “hours” have their own names: the Office of Readings (also called Vigils or Matins), Morning Prayer (Lauds), Mid-morning Prayer (Terce), Midday Prayer (Sext), Midafternoon Prayer (None), Evening Prayer (Vespers), and Night Prayer (Compline).

Each “hour” includes a hymn, several psalms with antiphons, a scripture reading, and prayers. Some are shorter, and thus are called “little hours”, and actually take only a few minutes to pray.

The longer “hours” – Matins, Lauds and Vespers – have more psalms or longer readings, and also include a New Testament canticle.

These “canonical hours” (socalled because their times and components are fixed by the laws or canons of the Church) are prayed by all clergy. Most men and women religious are also committed to praying the Hours as part of their service to the Church. Thus the Liturgy of the Hours is also known as “the Divine

Office” (sacred duty). Originally the texts were in large manuscripts found only in monasteries and churches; but travelling religious in the Middle Ages developed the idea of having the texts in smaller, portable books called “breviaries”. Wealthy laypeople often commissioned beautifully illuminated and illustrated breviaries for their personal use, called “Books of Hours”.

Also in the Middle Ages, Christian people tended to dwell near monasteries and churches where they had jobs farming the Church’s lands, and could also shelter within the monastic walls for protection from marauders. The people attended some of the canonical hours. However, most of them being illiterate, they needed something to do whilst the monks or nuns chanted the psalms. Thus

“Our Lady’s Psalter” was developed: 150 Our Fathers for the laity to pray as the 150 psalms were chanted. Later, 150 Hail Marys were substituted, and the Rosary was devised.

Not having clocks of their own,

Culture: the oxygen of our lives

What on earth is more pervasive and universal than culture? Even before a variety of regional languages came into existence, there must have been ways of being, thinking and doing in a locality that marked the distinctive character of its people as a cohesive unit. This is why we say, “when in Rome do as the Romans do” and consequently…” when in Australia do as the Australians do”.

Culture must have existed even before a language, written or spoken, came into use. Doubtless Neanderthal man lived within a culture. And this is the reason why scholars must examine ancient texts minutely: the words are all culturally dressed up.

In a real sense there is no way of understanding the Bible except through the framework of concepts, imagination and mental categories provided within that ancient culture. The Gospels relate events that took place at a particular time and place in history: in Palestine, not in Brazil or Scotland. The language they used was Hebrew, not Chinese or English. Wherever

the gospel is preached it must be preached in a human language, which means the language of a particular culture.

Had there been no culture and language spoken at the time of the Incarnation of the Son of God, nothing of what Christian believers have been able to experience during the last twenty centuries could have happened! Had there been no Mary and Joseph to welcome Him and, more importantly, had there been no one willing to take Him to heart, nothing could have happened! Even if culture still defies rigorous definition, according to many anthropologists, it nonetheless remains clothed in splendour and secrecy amidst human realities.

The life of the Church cannot be divorced from its surrounding culture. It would run the risk of becoming unreal, of running on separate tracks altogether, of existing but being regarded as meaningless by the mainstream culture! Yet this is the acid test Christian Churches are facing in Australia at the moment. The image of the Church is well captured by the parable of the

the farmers and labourers relied on the church bells to summon them to work in the morning, invite them to take their midday break for lunch, and return to their homes in the evening. These three times were accompanied by prayers which developed into the Angelus. God’s work of redemption and Mary’s obedience to His will was recalled as a way of sanctifying the day.

I recall my childhood when all of these “Catholic moments” were a part of parish life. My school day began with morning Mass. Sunday evening saw me serving or singing in church for parish Vespers and Benediction. Daily private recitation of the Rosary was encouraged, and it was prayed publicly in the church every evening in May and October.

The Angelus was ringing when I took my turn to serve the 6am weekday Mass. The entire school prayed it at noon before lunch. And I remember stopping in the street and removing my cap to pray it at 6 in the evening as I made my way home from playing. Grown men also doffed their hats, joining women and girls who stopped what they were doing when the bells rang out the call to prayer.

In fact, where did the Muslims get minarets? From the churches and bell-towers they co-opted and converted into mosques during their raids to conquer the thenChristian Middle East.

Yes, Christians inherited daily prayer from the Jews, and Muslims got an idea or two from both Jews and Christians. Like you, I admire the Muslims for their public fidelity to daily prayer. Perhaps we Catholics could again put more of a public face on our ancient prayer traditions.

The Priests Vocation

It was about 2.30am on a cold wintry morning. Awakened by the constant ringing of the phone, I fumbled for it in a dreamng state. It was an emergency call from the local public hospital. A patient was in great distress and was highly agitated. He desperately wanted to see a priest. After jumping out of the cosy doona and throwing some water over my head, I quickly grabbed my pastoral care ‘kit’ and drove straight to the hospital.

On the way, I was wondering about the patient. Who could it be? this person whom I was to meet on the other side of the door? What would be his or her background? What distress or suffering would this patient be undergoing? I have to admit that I am not a morning person, but I remembered to ask Jesus to bring His presence and healing to whatever situation I might encounter. Before I could finish my prayer I found myself checking in through the security door and following the officer along the corridors to the patient’s room.

Michael was a man in his early sixties, covered in medical tubes with an oxygen mask. He spoke to me between his gasping efforts. But it did not worry him. He just wanted to make sure he was to be reconciled with God and everybody before being transferred to Royal Perth Hospital for the last attempt to revive his failing heart. He was fully aware of the risks involved and the slim chance of making it. He had prepared several different notes to go through, and he found one for me. As I listened to his life story and his journey of faith, I realised how much it meant for him to be assured of God’s love and forgiveness. When he was ready I helped him with the Sacraments for the Sick and Dying.

sower who went out to sow: it is true that some of the seeds got lost, but some took root… One cannot imagine a sower using seeds which are completely foreign or totally unassimilable by the soil of human cultures.

Christian scholars today are more and more revisiting the history of the Church from a cultural perspective. The task is urgent. It is a matter of grasping not only facts and events, positive or negative to our tastes, but of trying to understand why certain things in the life of the world and of the Church, simultaneously both spectator and instigator, have happened the way they did and why.

Cultural diversity rejects domination or stand-over tactics. It respects diversity because it believes it to be a necessary dimension of our humanity, like roundness is to a circle. When this assumption cannot be made, the difficulty lies not within cultural diversity itself but within the socially construed reality of the group that experiences the difficulty.

It was one of the most humbling experiences of being a priest, especially for me who was newly ordained. I will never forget the sense of deep peace and relief on his face after I counselled him and administered the Sacraments of Reconciliation, Anointing and the Holy Communion. He seemed ready to go without a slightest worry in the world. He died two days later.

This is certainly one of the many familiar stories about priestly ministry that we hear, except this time, it happened to me. It is a most humbling moment and yet also a source of great joy, for I was able to be in the right place at the right time in the Person of Christ. The little discomfort from the early phone call was nothing in comparison to the tremendous joy I felt. This is no doubt one of the most unexpected but fulfilling and satisfying aspects of being a priest. [Fr Francis Nguyen can be contacted in the Kalgoorlie Parish/Zone at Tel # 9021 2100 or Fax # 9021 7248 for more on the joys of the priesthood.]

Call to holiness is answered

Vatican publishes bigger, more accurate calendar of Catholics saints

Three years after finishing the massive project of updating and correcting the booklength calendar of Catholic saints, the Vatican has published an even bigger, more accurate version.

The "Martyrologium Romanum" ("Roman Martyrology") was presented to the public on December 4 during a conference on holiness and the complicated task of separating fact from legend when dealing with martyrs and saints who lived and died many centuries ago and whose lives gave rise to fervent devotion and, perhaps, fanciful stories.

Like the 2001 edition, the newest volume is available only in Latin; however, officials of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments said Italian, French and German translations are under way.

The martyrology - with its 6,658 individual names and an additional 6,881 unnamed martyred "companions" - is organised as a calendar; it lists the saints and

blesseds whose feast is celebrated each day and provides a small biography of each.The 844-page martyrology is considered a liturgical book, not a catalogue or history, because it forms the basis for determining which saint is remembered at Mass each day.

The Italian newspaper Il Messaggero conducted a study of the names in the volume's index.

The most common first name for a saint or blessed, it reported

on December 5, is John (or one of its equivalents such as Giovanni or Johann) with more than 330 entries. Maria or Mary is second with more than 250 entries.

The top five is rounded out with Peter, Joseph and Francis.

The Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments said the revised martyrology includes 117 individuals who were not in the 2001 edition: 66 of those were beatified by Pope John Paul between the time the last volume went to press and April 2004, the deadline for the current volume.

The other 51 new names were those added after research proved that they, too, had authorised feast days.

New saints canonised by Pope John Paul during the period did not have to be added to the book, since they already were listed as blessed. Now, though, it points out they are saints.

Revising the martyrology was complicated, said a statement from the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments. The Vatican did not consolidate the process for declaring saints until the late 1500s, instituting procedures - strengthened over the years - to ensure the Church had firm facts about the identity and lives of the individuals canonised.

Still, the congregation said, "the Roman Martyrology does not aim to be a complete list of all the saints of the Church. The presence of a saint within it simply means there is certainty that devotion approved by the Church exists.

"On the other hand, the absence of a name either denotes the lack of an officially authorised devotion or that, in the presence of reasonable doubts (about the person's identity), it did not seem opportune to propose the person for the devotion of the universal Church," the statement said.

Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins, prefect of the Congregation for Saints' Causes, told the December 4 conference that the growing number of individuals beatified and canonised is part of the Catholic Church's pastoral obligation to remind every Christian that they are called to holiness.

"The Church would be aiming way too low if it did not propose as the goal of every Christian the radicalism of the Sermon on the Mount," he said.

Cardinal Saraiva Martins said Pope John Paul has beatified 1,345 individuals and has proclaimed 483 new saints.

Many of them, he said, "are common Christians who, in their concrete situations, lived the Gospel

Mary, the ultimate in holiness

Immaculate Conception:

Church marks anniversary of difficult dogma

Pope John Paul II led celebrations of the 150th anniversary of the Immaculate Conception, a dogma that many modern Catholics do not fully understand.

The Vatican hosted a fourday International Mariological Congress to mark the event, attended by Marian experts -- Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant -- from all over the world. Participants joined the Pope for a commemorative liturgy in St. Peter's Basilica on December 8, the feast of the Immaculate Conception.

The festivities included a special "Concert for Immaculate Mary" in the Vatican's audience hall, featuring a number of pieces written in her honour.

Whether the fanfare at the Vatican reverberated in local church communities was another question.

Some Vatican officials said candidly that while Marian devotion remains strong in the Church, the Immaculate Conception is a complex concept that has interested theologians more than the ordinary faithful.

"There's been an incredible dumbing-down of Catholics in the last generation or two, so there's probably a fair amount of confusion about this," said Msgr Arthur Calkins, a Vatican official and a member of the Pontifical International Marian Academy.

For one thing, Msgr. Calkins said, some people wrongly assume the Immaculate Conception refers to the conception of Christ. In fact, it refers to the belief that Mary, by special divine favour, was without sin from the moment she was conceived.

But the main stumbling block for many Catholics is original sin.

"People today simply are less and less aware of original sin. And without that awareness, the Immaculate Conception makes no sense," said one Vatican official.

The late Bishop Fulton Sheen put it another way in 1974, speaking about the loss of the sense of sin: "It used to be that the Catholics were the only ones to believe in the Immaculate Conception. Now everyone believes he is the immaculately conceived."

Pope Pius IX proclaimed the dogma in 1854, but the idea that Mary was born without the stain of sin did not appear out of the blue. It took shape after a long and complicated theological debate that, in some respects, still continues.

Already in the earliest Christian times Mary was held to be an ideal model of holiness, and by the eighth century Eastern Christians were celebrating a feast in honour of Mary's conception.

Medieval theologians took up the question, but they had to overcome their own biases and biological notions. For example, St Bernard of Clairvaux argued in the 12th century that the Holy Spirit could not have been involved in anything so base as the conception of a child.

Other theologians were hindered by their belief that the human soul was infused into the fetus 40 or 80 days after conception

- and thus Mary as a conceived unborn would have been subject to original sin until that moment. For centuries, theologians hesitated to say that Mary was completely free from original sin because they thought it would contradict a major tenet of the faith, the universality of redemption. In the 13th century, the Franciscan Duns Scotus found a new way to look at it, saying that Mary's special role did not free her from the need of redemption - it simply required a different form of Christ's mediating grace.

When Pope Pius IX proclaimed the dogma, he cited two key biblical sources. The Book of Genesis relates that God told the serpent that he would "put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers. He will

fully. They are not geniuses, but normal women and men who, in imitating Christ, lived their lives heroically."

The Portuguese cardinal offered Blessed Peter Friedhofen as an example.

The 41-year-old, beatified in 1985, "was a chimneysweep - I know that's hard to believe. On the tapestries that hang in St Peter's Square (during the ceremonies), never before was there a blessed chimneysweep. It took John Paul II for that." Il Messaggero, the Italian newspaper, also credited Pope John Paul with increasing the percentage of women among those recognised as holy by the Church.

Women make up between 15 percent and 20 percent of the saints and blesseds proclaimed before mid-1978, the newspaper reported. Pope John Paul's "average is clearly more comforting: About 40 percent" of those recognised by him are women.

Cardinal Saraiva Martins told the conference, "To criticism about the inflation of saints and blesseds, John Paul II was said to have replied serenely, 'It's the Holy Spirit's fault.'

"If holiness exists within the Church, the pope's reasoning goes, why not recognise it?" the cardinal said.

crush your head." Pope Pius and others saw this as a prophecy of the Immaculate Conception. But their understanding was probably influenced by a scriptural translation now considered inaccurate, which rendered the verse: "She will crush your head." That's why there are still so many statues of Mary crushing the head of the serpent with her foot.

The other passage cited by Pope Pius was St Luke's account of the Annunciation. The angel Gabriel's salutation, "Hail, full of grace," is understood as recognizing that Mary must always have been free from sin -- an idea being developed and strengthened by Msgr Calkins and other Marian experts.

In published articles, Msgr Calkins has also contributed to a still-sim-

mering debate in Marian theology: whether Mary should be recognised as "co-redemptrix," or "coredeemer," with Christ. The idea is to recognise that, albeit in a secondary and dependant way, no other human being collaborated in the work of redemption as Mary did.

But to many nonexperts, the title sounds as if the church were "putting Mary in the Trinity," as one priest remarked. While that is not the intent of the idea's promoters, the inevitable problem of explanation may be one reason why most Marian experts who met at the Vatican in 1997 opposed such a move; others still support it, however. Some scholars say the fault line on this issue dates back to the Second Vatican Council. On one side were those who emphasised the analogy between Mary and Christ, stressing Mary's active collaboration in the work of redemption; on the other side were experts who saw Mary as analogous to the Church, embodying the ideal of the Church's response to the Lord.

The latter group, which views Mary more as "woman of faith" than a "mediator," has dominated Marian scholarship since Vatican II. But some Mariologists view that as a minimalist approach and say it is too intellectual to really inspire devotion.

In a recently published article on the Immaculate Conception in the Rome journal "Divinitas," Msgr Calkins titled a closing section, "The Immaculate Co-redemptrix." That's a term some Marian scholars are still hoping will find greater acceptance. - CNS

THE WORLD

The truth about religious freedom

No nation has a perfect religious freedom record, Vatican official says

Perfect religious freedom does not exist in any country in the world, said Archbishop Giovanni Lajolo, the Vatican’s foreign minister.

“Even in states in which the right to religious freedom is taken very seriously,” he said, perfection is missing, often because a concern for church-state separation leads to penalising religious activity in the public sphere.

Archbishop Lajolo was the keynote speaker at a December 3 conference in Rome sponsored by the US Embassy to the Vatican.

While the conference focused on major violations of religious freedom around the world, particularly in China and the Middle East, Archbishop Lajolo said limits on religious freedom exist almost everywhere.

For instance, he said, government and taxation policies may limit the rights of parents to choose a religious education for their children or may penalise the charitable work of the Church

by not recognising its nonprofit status.

Attempts to ban religiously motivated positions from public policy debates are also infringements on religious freedom, he said.

Archbishop Lajolo and other speakers at the conference also voiced concern about the increasing threats to Christians in Iraq and in other countries with a Muslim majority following the

US-led invasion of Iraq. “It should be recognised that the war against terrorism, even though necessary, had as one of its side effects the spread of ‘Christianophobia’ in vast areas of the globe,” the archbishop said.

In many places, he said, “Western civilisation or certain political strategies of Western countries are considered to be determined by Christianity or, at least, not separated from it.”

Thanksgiving, but not God

A Thanksgiving poem mentioning God ended up being the subject of controversy in a New Jersey public school.

The poem, written by Kaeley Hay, a Catholic fifth-grade student at Lincoln-Franklin School in Garwood, was eventually posted as written on the school bulletin board, but not without some bureaucratic headaches and a groundswell of support from the local religious community.

The poem was part of a Thanksgiving assignment and had been voted by students to be displayed on the school bulletin board. But before it was posted, it was altered.

The school principal told Kaeley’s mother, Colleen, that the word “God” was deleted from the poem to play it “safe.”

Kaeley’s mother, surprised by the school decision, mentioned it to her pastor, Msgr John Philip O’Connor, at the Church of St Anne in Garwood.

In a Thanksgiving message, the priest offered his congratulations to the “young author and her expression of faith.”

Catholic student’s poem mentioning God faced public school battle

“We salute and stand with her parents for objecting to the removal of the word ‘God’ from their daughter’s poem,” he said.

Parish officials expressed their concern to the principal and at first they were told nothing could be done, but several hours later, the principal said that after consulting with a school board attorney, the word “God” could be restored to the poem.

The poem was published on the front cover of the parish bulletin the weekend of November 20-21 and read at all Masses. Two other local churches also read the poem at their services.

Retired Newark Archbishop Peter L Gerety wrote a note to Kaeley praising her poem and saying she had been given a “great talent” by God. The archbishop also read the poem in his Thanksgiving homily at St Gabriel Parish in Saddle River.

The Catholic Advocate, archdiocesan newspaper of Newark, had called Kaeley’s school for comments but was told all press

inquires should go through the superintendent’s office. Several calls to the superintendent’s office were not returned.

The text of Kaeley’s poem is as follows:

Leaves are falling out of the air, Piles of leaves everywhere! Scarecrows standing High up with the corn, Farmers harvest in the early morn. Pilgrims thank God, For what they were given,/Everybody say.../Happy Thanksgiving! -CNS

ly veiled attempt at proselytism or where Christianity is seen as Western colonialism or interference in the life of a nation. John V. Hanford III, the US ambassadorat-large for international religious freedom, told the conference, “Far too many people continue to suffer for their faith. In fact, over half of the world’s people live under governments that restrict religious freedom.”

He said the US State Department continues to list Myanmar, China, Iran, North Korea and Sudan as “countries of particular concern” for their restrictions on religious liberty, and this year the government added Eritrea, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam to the list.

“It has been joked that the only countries that come off our CPC list are countries we’ve invaded,” he said, but the fact is that the US government has seen enough improvement in Afghanistan and Iraq to remove them from the list.

Archbishop Lajolo said the Vatican has asked the UN Commission on Human Rights to condemn “Christianophobia” along with “Islamophobia” and anti-Semitism.

Speaking to reporters later, the archbishop said anti-Christian or anti-Catholic sentiments are found not only in Muslim countries, but in other nations where church-sponsored educational or charitable work is seen as a thin-

Still, Hanford said, the US government is concerned about new threats against Christians in Iraq and the growing exodus of members of the country’s Christian communities.

Hanford also said the decrease in the number of Christians arrested in China over the past year “is a statistical fluke” after several years of a strong crackdown on religious activity. -CNS

Call for responsible parents

Qatar conference calls for societal strengthening of parenthood

Responsible parenthood is the basis of family life, which must be promoted and protected by society and the state, said participants at an international meeting on family issues in Doha, Qatar.

Representatives from many countries, religions and organisations attended the November Doha International Conference on the Family, sponsored by the emir of Qatar, to discuss how to protect the traditional family structure that many see as under attack from secular forces. Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Trujillo, who heads the Pontifical Council for the Family, told the conference on November 30 that parenthood has been devalued in contemporary life and that it is in any state’s best interests to enhance the parent’s role in society.

A copy of the cardinal’s speech was released by the Vatican on December 2. “The family, a natural society, exists prior to the state, any other political organisation or jurisdictional institution,” the cardinal said. “Therefore, the originality

and identity of the family based on marriage must be recognised by the political authorities.

“We are disturbed by the dramatic devaluation of motherhood in our societies,” he said.

Women should not be “obliged” to work outside the home, he said.

“Motherhood is not simply a job comparable to many other worthy professions; it is much more,” he said. The father’s role, Cardinal Lopez said, “which all too often is obscured, is of great importance in the formation of the children’s personality ... the father’s presence in the home is an essential element of the children’s upbringing.”

Cardinal Lopez said that in Europe and North America “an ideology hostile to the family is spreading in some parliaments.” He was referring to recent legislative proposals in Europe and North America allowing gay marriage or granting legal status to gay couples. He opposed what he called “polyform sexuality” that makes “sexuality a choice or option derived from cultural development, and not bound to an essential constitution.” The cardinal also criticised an “exacerbated feminism that considers marriage and the family a place of slavery, and fatherhood and motherhood an unbearable burden that turns to fear.” -CNS

Crisis looms in West Papua

Church leaders fear crisis as Indonesian troops fight separatists

At least 5,000 people in Indonesia’s West Papua province face hunger and starvation after fleeing a military offensive against separatists, church leaders in the region said.

The ecumenical Christian Church Council in West Papua said in a late November statement that 15 people, including 13 children, already have died and many others were sick since the military offensive began on August 17 in Puncak Jaya.

“They have been starving in the refugee camps,” said the Rev. Socrates Sofyan Yoman, council chairman.

Providing food and medical supplies to the refugees has been nearly impossible because the military has closed off the region to humanitarian aid workers, the statement said.

The situation has grown so desperate that church leaders in West Papua are calling on the gov-

ernment to withdraw all combat troops from the region. They also are calling on the government and military to allow humanitarian aid workers to assist the needy, the statement said.

The church leaders are accusing troops, including the Kopassus special forces unit, of human rights violations, the statement said.

A Protestant minister, the Rev. Elisa Tabuni, was killed by Kopassus troops on September 17

after the unit accused the minister of being a separatist, the statement said.

Indonesian security forces also have destroyed people’s homes and burned churches in Puncak Jaya, according to the statement.

The displaced will not return to their homes until troops leave their villages because in the past any West Papuan emerging from the forest was accused of being a separatist by Indonesian forces,

the statement said. “As long as Indonesian combat troops are still controlling the region, Papuan refugees will not return to their homes and villages,” Rev. Yoman said.

The Indonesian military began their latest operation in West Papua after accusing members of the Free Papua Movement of killing seven civilians. However, human rights groups in West Papua and Jakarta said the military orchestrated the incident by using local Papuans as militias.

Hardus Desa, secretary for Bishop Leo Laba Ladjar of Jayapura, said church leaders were calling for an independent inquiry to examine the causes of the conflict in West Papua and the impact the most recent military operation has had on residents’ lives.

Desa, who also serves as council secretary, said church leaders were seeking access to the displaced camps in order to help the refugees and assess their condition.

“Church leaders believe that people living under this oppressive situation deeply need a pastoral visit,” he said. -CNS

Priest dies a hero in Philippines tragedy

When villagers found the bloated body of Father Charlito Colendres on November 30, a rope he used to steady himself as he rescued villagers from rising floodwater was still tied around his waist.

Father Colendres, 48, chancellor of the Infanta Territorial Prelature, was one of hundreds of victims of a typhoon and a tropical storm that blew through the Philippines’ northeast provinces,. At least 740 people have been reported dead; more than 750 remain missing, The Associated Press reported in early December. More than 200,000 people have been displaced by the storms.

Father Colendres died in the village of Pilaway, where he went on November 29 to rescue peo-

around the world

Mary celebrated

Priest killed while rescuing others during typhoon in Philippines

ple in danger from the storms. Fighting strong currents, he tied a rope around his and a parish worker’s waists; he tied the other end to an electrical post so the water would not drag them away. But a six-foot-high surge of water carrying logs and other debris hit them and knocked them unconscious.

“Before I collapsed I heard Father Cha gasping and crying for me saying, ‘You can do it. Live, save yourself,’” Dionisio Cadungog, 17, a chancery employee, said after the priest’s December 6 funeral Mass at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Shrine in Quezon City.

As Catholics throughout the world observed the feast of the Immaculate Conception on December 8, the people of Guam renewed their own long-standing tradition of faith and devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

About 8,000 Guam Catholics gathered in the capital city of Agana for a traditional procession in honour of Santa Marian Kamalen, as Mary is revered on Guam.

The annual procession is part of a tradition of faith and culture that has existed for more than 100 years on this predominantly Catholic island.

The feast day was declared a holiday

Among the celebrants were Bishop Rolando Tirona of Infanta and his predecessor, retired Bishop Julio Labayen.

“I cried when I lost this brilliant son, but learning the circumstances of his death I said, ‘What more could I wish for?’” Bishop Labayen said during the funeral.

Cadungog recalled how he and the late priest went house to house, trying to convince villagers to evacuate.

He said that when it rained heavily all evening on November 29 Father Colendres sensed danger for people in Banugao, a lowlying village that floods easily dur-

on Guam in 1971. Santa Marian Kamalen, also known as Our Lady of Camarin, is the patroness of Guam and the Northern Marianas.

Many feel she interceded to protect the island during major catastrophes such as war, earthquakes and other natural disasters.

Thanks to the Pope

Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari thanked Pope John Paul II for the help he always has given the Iraqi people, and he pledged that the country’s new government would promote full religious freedom.

The foreign minister met Pope John Paul II on December 13, exactly one year after US troops captured Saddam Hussein and less than a week after an Armenian Catholic

ing rains. “We banged on doors and urged people to go with us and transfer to safer grounds at the municipal hall,” Cadungog said. “Some were hardheaded and answered that as they would die anyway from hunger after the floods they’d rather die together inside their homes.”

Cadungog said he told Father Colendres not to leave the chancery at the height of the typhoon, but the priest drove his jeep past fallen trees and electrical poles and through floodwaters to borrow a 10-wheeler truck. Father Colendres went to several villages, where he carried small children and led others to the vehicle. He pulled a 1-year-old child from the rushing water, Cadungog said.

Church and a Chaldean Catholic bishop’s residence were damaged in an attack by armed men.

Zebari also met with Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Vatican secretary of state.

“In the course of the meetings, the situations currently existing in Iraq and in the Middle East in general were reviewed,” said a December 13 statement from Joaquin Navarro-Valls, the Vatican spokesman.

Zebari, he said, assured the Pope of “the commitment of his government to promote religious freedom and, particularly, the defence of the Christian communities.”

Cultural progress

Official relations between the Catholic Church and the Russian Orthodox Church may be strained, but joint efforts in the area

Christians are called to live in harmony with the Church’s social teachings despite fears they might not be up to the task, said Pope John Paul II.

Catholic social doctrine is “a demanding standard of justice and action,” but that should not lead the faithful to feel its principles are “too great and noble” to ever be actualized in this world, he said.

The Pope’s message came in an address he made on December 4 in the Vatican to participants attending the “Centesimus Annus” Foundation’s annual congress.

The Pope said it occasionally seems that Church social doctrine is more talked about than properly understood.

The Pope said that since its establishment more than 10 years ago the foundation’s aim has been to offer concrete support to the Pope and the Holy See while making the Church’s teachings on social issues more widely known.

The Pope remarked it was “very suitable” that the foundation was focusing this year’s meeting on the “Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church.”

The compendium, released on October 25 by the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, explains Church social teachings, which in turn provide guidelines for living a moral, Christian life.

The Pope said it occasionally seems that Church social doctrine is more talked about than properly understood.

“Therefore, it’s rather important to aim to introduce Church social teaching in a precise, motivated, complete way,” the Pope said.

Catholic doctrine should be taught to be “a stimulating point of reference” for what one’s social, professional and civic duties are in upholding the life and dignity of humankind, the Pope said.

Catholic social doctrine also must be presented “as an element defining the spirituality of the lay faithful,” he said.

“Lay Christians who are open to the grace of God are the living instruments” necessary to bring those values that foster solidarity and harmony among peoples to the fore, said the Pope.

of culture have picked up speed.

Orthodox Metropolitan Filaret of Minsk, Belarus, president of the theological commission of the Russian Orthodox Church, invited French Cardinal Paul Poupard, president of the Pontifical Council for Culture, to give the keynote speech at a December 10-11 conference on the importance of Christian values to Europe. A press statement from the cardinal’s Vatican office said the invitation to the conference in Minsk was “a visible fruit of 25 years of correspondence” between the two church leaders. The statement said the cardinal told his audience, “The Christian faith is an essential factor of Europe, and the Churches today are faced with the challenge of confronting secularism, indifference and unbelief among Europeans.”

-CNS

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The Black Regiment of the American Revolution

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Clare and Francis

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Why Epossumondas Has No Hair on His Tail

By Coleen Salley, illustrated by Janet Stevens. Harcourt Inc. (San Diego, 2004). 31 pp., $16. Epossumondas wonders why his tail is not thick, furry, fluffy or bushy like the tails of his friends, so Mama tells him about how his great-great grandpa got himself in trouble with Bear and lost all the fluff. Salley’s book is full of action verbs and colourful adjectives that make this especially good as a read-aloud tale. Stevens’ illustrations of the persimmon-loving Papapossum, instigating Hare and aggravated Bear help make this book a winner. Ages 5 and up.

Claavera Abecedario, A Day of the Dead Alphabet Book

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The Best Catholic Writing 2004

Edited by Brian Doyle. Loyola Press (Chicago, 2004). 233 pp., $14.95.

■ Reviewed by Brian T Olszewski - CNS

That’s a risky title: “Best Catholic Writing.” Editor Brian Doyle doesn’t debate what “best” means in his introduction, but he does explain what “Catholic writing” is. It may be by Catholics, or for Catholics, or of Catholics, but it is also “catholic” because, “Everything, seen with a clear enough eye, is meat for the Catholic mind.”

And meaty it is. Readers might recognize the names of Andrew Greeley, Kathleen Norris or Margaret O’Brien Steinfels, but most of the writers are commercial unknowns. Who has written is less important than what they have written.

Few readers know writer Robert T Reilly, of Omaha, Neb., but many will relate to his story about caring for a loved one with Alzheimer’s. He writes, “I build my days around visits to her, not as corporal works of mercy, but as one of the joys of marriage. I love who she was, but I also love who she is.”

Jesuit Father Gary Smith might be better known among the poor in Portland, Oregon, and in Uganda than among readers. But readers of “The Leper: Robert’s Story” will find it impossible not to see Jesus in this deathbed scene described by Father Smith: “’O Robert, my man, my man, O Robert.’ And then I knelt at the side of his bed and wept and wept. The paradox is that, in the end, the little guy had been stripped of everything but was surrounded by the dearest of his possessions, his friends.”

This volume does get readers thinking, whether the topic is the sexual abuse of children by clergy, steps in faith formation or wondering why God leads people to do certain things. It inspires readers to examine their own lives, maybe to commit or recommit themselves to living the Gospel.

Most of the writing in this collection comes from national publications, such as Commonweal, US Catholic and National Catholic Reporter. None of the selections are from writers at diocesan newspapers, which tend to be local in focus, although they had an opportunity to submit work. And they will for future volumes. Doyle, who is the editor of Portland magazine, published by the University of Portland, Oregon’s Catholic university affiliated with the Congregation of Holy Cross, has extended a call for submissions for the 2005 “Best Catholic Writing.”

In any collection not everyone will like every topic or style. There are several pieces that address the sexual abuse scandal -- the topic that defined US Catholicism in the last couple of years. Yet some readers might have heard, read and seen enough of the topic with no need to digest more. The book also includes three pieces written in verse form. The writing is good, but the style seems out of place.

This 28-selection smorgasbord offers something for the person with only a few minutes to read every day as well as for the leisurely reader. It gives observers of Catholic writing an accurate idea of what constitutes “best,” provides an excellent overview of Catholic thought, and records for future historians an idea of what was happening in the church in 2004.

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DECEMBER

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19 Mass and Procession for Feast of St Lucy, SpearwoodArchbishop Hickey

Priestly Anniversary Mass for Bishop Sproxton at Mirrabooka

Friday December 17

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All night Eucharistic vigil at St Bernadette’s Church, Jugan Street, Glendalough commencing 9pm. Readings and reflections on the Hours of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ with hourly Rosaries and hymns. Concludes Saturday morning with Parish Mass at 7.30am, followed by Rosary and Benediction. All welcome. Enq: 9444 6131.

Sunday December 19

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LEGAL SERVICES

■ BRIDGE WATERS LEGAL

For professional advice & legal representation. Probate, Deceased Estates, Wills, Conveyancing, Property and Business Settlements, Leases, Commercial, Property & Business law matters. Level 3, 267 St George's Tce, Perth, Ph: 1300 139 680

MUMS ON A MISSION

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RELIGIOUS PRODUCTS

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■ RICH HARVEST BIBLES, Books, CD’s, Cards, gifts, Statues, Baptism & Communion Apparel, Albs, Vestments and much more. RICH HARVEST, 39 Hulme Court, Myaree, 9329 9889 after 10.30am.

THANK YOU

■ THANK YOU

To Our Lady of St Joseph and St Jude for prayers answered. M.C.

Classifieds 9227 7778

email: administration@ therecord.com.au

11 year old sceince exam answers

• “To collect fumes of sulphur, hold a deacon over a flame in a test tube.”

• “When you breathe, you inspire. When you do not breath, you expire.”

• “H2O is hot water, and CO2 is cold water.”

• “When you smell an oderless gas, it is probably carbon monoxide.”

• “Nitrogen is not found in Ireland because it is not found in a free state.”

• “Water is composed of two gins, Oxygin and Hydrogin. Oxygin is pure gin. Hydrogin is gin and water.”

• “Three kinds of blood vessels are arteries, vanes and caterpillars.”

• “Blood flows down one leg and up the other.”

• “Dew is formed on leaves when the sun shines down on them and makes them perspire.”

• “A super-saturated solution is one that holds more than it can hold.”

• “Mushrooms always grow in damp places and so they look like umbrellas.”

20 Christmas Cocktails Italo-Australia Welfare and Cultural CentreArchbishop Hickey

24 Mass at Foundations Catholic Ministry, Osborne ParkBishop Sproxton

Midnight Christmas Mass, St Mary’s Cathedral - Archbishop Hickey

Midnight Christmas Mass, Como - Bishop Sproxton

of the Blessed Sacrament and Holy Rosary.

2.30pm Holy Mass. Monthly Pilgrimage is held on the last Sunday of the month in honour of the Virgin of the Revelation. Next pilgrimage is on Boxing Day, December 26 at 2pm. Anointing of the sick is administered for spiritual and physical healing during Holy Mass every second Sunday of the month. The side entrance to the Church is open daily between 9am and 5pm for private prayer. Enq: contact SACRI 9447 3292.

Tuesday December 21

COME HOME FOR CHRISTMAS

Why not take out a little time just before Christmas to set things right with God in the Sacrament of Penance? No need to put it off any longer, join us at 7.30pm at Mater Christi Church, 340 Yangebup Road, Yangebup. You will find a friendly and warm welcome here!

Friday December 24

LATIN MASS

There will be a traditional Latin Mass this Christmas Eve at Our Lady of Fatima, 8 Foss St, Palmyra. at 9pm. All welcome.

Saturday December 25

SUNG LATIN MASSES

Christmas Masses at St John’s Pro-Cathedral, Victoria Ave, Perth. 12 Midnight Sung Mass preceded by Rosary and carols at 11pm, 8am Dawn Mass, 9.30am Day Mass. All welcome. Enq: Fr Michael Rowe 9444 9604.

Saturday January 1

WITNESS FOR LIFE PROCESSION

The next First Saturday Mass, procession and Rosary vigil will commence with Mass at 8.30am at

St Anne’s Church, Hehir St Belmont. We proceed prayerfully to the Rivervale Abortion Centre and conclude with Rosary led by Fr Paul Carey SSC. Please join us to pray peacefully for the conversion of hearts. Enq: Helen 9402 0349.

Sunday January 2

FUNDRAISING DINNER CHANGE OF VENUE

The Franciscans of the Immaculate wish to advise that due to unforseen circumstances the venue for the fundraising dinner has now been changed to Vasto Club Casa D’Abruzzo, 1 Vasto Place, Balcatta. Any inconvenience caused is deeply regretted.

Sunday January 2

DIVINE MERCY

An afternoon with Jesus and Mary at St Mary’s Cathedral, Victoria Square Perth at 1.30pm. Holy rosary and reconciliation, sermon with Fr Anthony Van Dyke OP – The Epiphany. Followed by Divine Mercy Prayers and Benediction. Enq: John 9457 7771 or Linda 9275 6608.

Sunday January 23

PORTUGUESE SARDINE FESTIVAL

Fundraiser for Crossroads Community at St Jerome’s in Spearwood at 1pm. Please ring CRC 9319 8344 for more information.

NOVENA

The monthly novena to Our Lady of good health Vailankanni on the last Saturday of the month has been cancelled due to Christmas falling on that day. Will follow up next month.

SEPERATED, DIVORCED, WIDOWED

The Beginning Experience is running Coping pro-

• “The body consists of three partsthe brainium, the borax and the abominable cavity. The brainium contains the brain, the borax contains the heart and lungs, and the abominable cavity contains the bowls, of which there are five - a, e, i, o, and u.”

• “The pistol of a flower is its only protection against insects.”

grams to assist people in learning to close the door gently on a relationship that has ended in order to get on with living. The next courses will commence on January 8 & 15 in Busselton and January 22 & 29 in Perth. Enq: Bev 9315 9303 (Perth) or Audrey 9752 4139 (Busselton).

2005 JOSEPHITE CALENDARS

With Mary MacKillop’s word – inspirations from her writings matched with attractive colour photos. Major church feasts and Sundays of the Liturgical year, and many other features. Suitable for home, office, classroom, waiting room, staffroom etc. $5.50 each. Enq: Sister Maree 9334 0933.

CROSS ROADS COMMUNITY

Term 4 – 18 October to 17 December for: Family & Friends Support Groups of Substance Abusers on Wednesdays 7–9pm, Substance Abusers Support Groups on Tuesdays 5.30pm – 7.30pm Friday's All day Group for Substance Abusers 9.30am – 2pm, Bible Night: Tuesdays 7 – 9pm & Healing Mass: Fridays 12.30pm. Healing Masses: 1st Monday of month 7pm Church of East Fremantle, 2nd Monday of month 10am St Jerome’s Munster. No Healing Masses in January 2005.

Saturday November 13, 2005

50TH ANNIVERSARY

Of the Mukinbudin Catholic Church, Our Lady Help of Christians will be celebrated on the above date. All past parishioners and religious are invited to attend. Names of past parishioners are sought and photos and memorabilia are needed for a short history of this church. Contact: Merle McInnes Box 34, Mukinbudin, 6479. Phone: 9048 4011.

Due to the large number of contributions to the Panorama section it is important to get your items in as soon as possible. Email: administration@therecord.com.au

or phone: KYLIE 9227 7080.

the last word

Maranatha graduates enthusiastic for new theology course

Five people graduated with a Diploma of Pastoral Ministry and 52 people gained other qualifications at the Maranatha Institute graduation Mass on December 7.

Bishop Don Sproxton concelebrated the Mass with Fr Vincent Glynn, Director of Adult Faith Eduction Programs in the Archdiocese, Fr John Jegorow and Fr Joe Parkinson, and presented certificates to all graduates.

The Diploma course qualifies people to be employed as Pastoral Ministers in a variety of Church-related fields.

It requires completion of 13 courses in adult faith education and a year of supervised pastoral ministry, under the direction of Sr Josephine Dillon RSM.

This year’s graduates are:

■ Adri Sudjana, who completed this pastoral ministry with the Indonesian Catholic Community.

■ Joy Pullen, who worked with the Servite parish in Joondana.

■ Sr Maureeen Williams RSJ, who worked at East Victoria Park parish.

■ Gerry Smith, who worked at Mirrabopoka.

■ Anita De’Souza, who worked with teams of catechists.

Seven students received the Graduation Certificate for completing the 13 AFE courses, and 25 people received Accreditation certificates for completing four or more of the AFE courses.

A highlight of this year’s graduation ceremony was the presentation of certificates to the first graduates from a new adult faith education theology program called “Beginning Theology”.

This program that has been brought to the Archdiocese by the Maranatha Institute of Adult Faith Education and is directed by Sr Margaret-Anne Beech. It is a parish and home based program for adults interested in extending their spiritual knowledge and faith life.

The first 20 graduates of the program were presented with their Certificate

II in Systematic Theology by Bishop Sproxton and were most enthusiastic about about their experience with the program.

Joy Bromley says she would "recommend the course to anyone". She explained that she had undertaken the program over 18 months, meeting every three weeks on a rotating basis in the homes of the four people she undertook the program with from the Greenwood Parish.

Joy found it a "rich" experience as did Patrice Wringe who undertook the program with another small group in Applecross. Patrice explained that as well as the group meetings there is a reading program and four assignments that have to be completed to satisfy the requirements for graduation.

Sr Margaret-Anne Beech, who coordinates the Beginning Theology program, explained that more than 50 people had been involved in the program around the Archdiocese, but most of them were involved for personal interest rather than seeking the formal certificate.

She said the program has been developed by the Institute of Faith Education in Brisbane and the Certificate in Systematic Theology is recognised nationally. Some 3,000 people around Australia have participated in the program since it was introduced in 1995 and it is now rapidly expanding in Perth.

Graduates from the Beginning Theology program are being offered a more advanced course next year called "Foundations" and the Beginning Theology course will be offered in more places as word is spreading of the personal benefit that individuals are finding in this program.

The general enthusiasm that was evident in the discussion with these first graduates suggests that the program is meeting a need in the lives of many people seeking to deepen their understanding of their faith, and enrich their spiritual life in a parish and home setting.