The 600th Edition of the Catholica e-Bulletin!

Dear Friends,

A "little" celebration today — it's our 600th edition of the Catholica e-Bulletin — or, rather, the 600th day since we publicly launched. I honestly don't know how we have succeeded but somehow we have survived and, God willing, hopefully there's much more life in this endeavour yet.

Our principal commentary today is the delayed commentary from Daniel that normally appears on a Friday. He's actually more than a day late because originally he had hoped his series would have been dealing with today's topic on Good Friday. It is an intriguing question that he endeavours to explore today, with the help of a few scholars who've been thinking about the question for a long time: Did Jesus go to Jerusalem knowing he would die, or did Jesus go to Jerusalem to die? Many people's eyes probably glaze over even thinking about the question. For many others though they have pursued it as scholars with a passion and many others have sacrificed their own lives in order to try and understand Jesus and follow what Jesus was on about. What do you think the evidence shows? <Read Daniel's commentary>

A bigger "celebration" tomorrow as Milly and I celebrate our first year as husband and wife — she's presenting a workshop and concert and we'll be publishing Tom McMahon's commentary as usual.

A pot-pourri of news…Update from Dr Armen Gakavian, Amanda McKenna involved in the release of As One Voice hymnal, Adele and Benedict Coyne representing Australian lawyers at competition in Bangalore. <more>

Getting to the heart of what we really believe… Inspired by a number of different influences, Vince Exley recently sat down an endeavoured to write out in a very honest way a summary of what he has really come to believe. He shares it with us here on Catholica. Should we all engage in this exercise from time to time of stripping ourselves of all those illusions and emotional attachments that often cloud our vision of what we really believe? <more>

A discussion on how much personal morality should intrude into public policy… Catholics, led by Augustine and Aquinas, have traditionally been more liberal than the Protestants, regarding public social policy. One could argue that arch-conservative Catholics want to change that today. Peregrinus re-visits some important principles considered in depth by Augustine and Aquinas as to how personal morality should impact on public social policy. It is always a vexed area of discussion as the current situation concerning a public park in Amsterdam illustrates very well. <more>

Cultivating the Spirit… It seems one of the great commonalities of life is that we're all "led to distraction" by all manner of sideshows. In this reflection, Dr Kania calls on the insights of writers like Blaise Pascal to draw the focus back to what is ultimately important. <more>

1.7: The future… For the next four or five weeks we rocket through to look at the final part of Tom Lee's manuscript. In looking to the future this may seem a major discontinuity to what we've been reading in this series so far but the introduction to this essay will hopefully provide a context for readers. <more>

The meaning of Easter — the meaning of Jesus… A short reflection from the editor, Brian Coyne, asking questions about the meaning we can extract from the Easter experience and how he has arrived at the views he holds today. <more>

Reflections on the nature of priesthood #9… Tom McMahon provides some insight into what motivated him to tackle this series and the challenges it has posed to him. Using John Donohue's Celtic concept of Anum Cara he points to a different sense of priesthood that seems to be emerging in society. Can the institution cope if the people wander off developing their own concepts of what priesthood means? <more>

Best wishes for a great day wherever you happen to be ... in life or in our world!

Brian Coyne
Editor and Publisher