EDITOR'S ROUND-UP

Saturday, 06 September 2008

Earn a degree at Catholica (LOL)!

Dear Friends,

When I opened up my email this morning I was only greeted with 48 bits of spam offering me you beaut opportunities to enlarge my member (if I responded to all the opportunities I am offered on this each, and if they all worked, I am sure by now it would reach to the moon), earn a doctorate without studying and without writing a dissertation, offering me fabulous jobs and income and I only have to put in 2 hours a day to merit it — about six of them were written in Russian or a language I can't even start to understand. There were three messages that were actually non-spam and valuable. The thought did occur to me though: Catholica today, if you had the time to read and really absorb it all, does offer the equivalent of the work you'd have to do for a degree in theology at even the best Catholic universities of the world. Stick around. This IS an exciting journey. And you don't even have to pay to subscribe!

And today's lead commentary is about a journey. It's the next instalment of Dr Ian Elmer's wonderful exploration of the journey (and journeys) of St Paul. Today he's "somewhere back near the beginning" of St Paul's Christian journey. He's teasing apart what we can understand about the nature of St Paul's "conversion"... <Link to Ian's commentary>

WHILE I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION: Next Saturday in Australia one of the regular stirrers on the Catholica forum will be the keynote speaker at the Australian Reforming Catholics Conference at Chatswood in Sydney. If you can be there, Be There! Sat, 13 September at Chatswood. (For full details seen the link at the end of this paragraph. If you can't "Be There!" you might like to visit the Australian Reforming Catholics website and take out a membership subscription to support this valuable endeavour. It might be even worthwhile foregoing your contributio to the plate for a few weeks if you think it worthwhile investing in a Church that can respond more effectively to people's needs in the modern world. If you haven't been to Church for a while and haven't made any contributions to the plate how about making some to ARC (or Catholica or any of those people who are now activiely pushing hard for a more responsive Church?) To find out more about the conference or to apply for membership visit their website (click the link that follows or click the promo at the bottom of this page). ARC has members in all States of Australia... <Link to ARC website>

A model for re-unifying the Christian church… As regular readers of Catholica by now well appreciate, our regular Tuesday lead commentator, Dr Andrew Thomas Kania, has become a passionate advocate for the Eastern rite Catholic churches who maintain their communion with the Latin Church headquartered in Rome. This week he has taken his advocacy to a new level scoring the lead story in The Tablet with a passionate commentary urging the Latin Church to pay greater heed to the universality and 'catholic' nature of Catholicism. It's an article that extends beyond simple advocacy for the Eastern churches and urges all of us to re-discover the depth, beauty and universality of our faith. Catholica is strongly supportive of the particular calls Dr Kania is making in his advocacy on behalf of Eastern Catholics in general and the Ukrainian Catholic Church in particular. We also believe there are themes in Dr Kania's expositions that might profitably be taken up within the Latin Rite Church to the benefit of its local churches around the world. You'll find a link to Dr Kania's article in The Tablet at the conclusion of today's editorial. We invite you to return and share your views on Dr Kania's article and the editorial in our forum. <more>

Congratulations… There is no formal lead commentary today for the reasons disclosed by the editor in our forum [See: Post #16486]. The editor did put an extended post on the forum last night though drawing attention to the celebrations yesterday of the Sisters of St Joseph Lochinvar of their 125th Anniversary and posing a few questions regarding the future of religious congregations in this country. <more>

A discussion on how we bring about true reconciliation… There is much discussion on our forum, on other discussion boards and in the media about this latest spate of sexual abuse stories to hit the headlines. Today's Wednesday Forum endeavours to open up discussion firstly on why issues suddenly become so public like this. Secondly, and more importantly, it endeavours to open up discussion about how we (any community) brings about reconciliation when there have been transgressions and injustices. We Catholics ought have much wisdom on the subject of reconciliation. <more>

Faith: an antidote to fear… It seems an intrinsic part of the human condition that we are plagued by anxiety and fear. In today's commentary Dr Andrew Kania with help from some quite illustrious thinkers, both ancient and modern, examines this challenge that all humans are called upon to surmount. In what legitimate ways can we look to Jesus, and our faith, as the antidote to fear? <more>

An allegory… In a very different style to his first commentary for Catholica Vinnie Nauheimer's contribution today comes in the form of an allegory written around Dante Alighieri's 14th Century allegory of the Inferno of Hell that has so shaped our thinking from his classic work in literature, The Divine Comedy. <more>

A victim of clerical sexual abuse lays it on the line Vinnie Nauheimer has written extensively on the subject of clerical abuse. He has written two books on the subject of clergy abuse. One of poetry "Silent Screams" and one comprised of selected letters sent over an eight year period on the subject of clergy abuse called "Epistles on Clergy Abuse". His art, poetry and writing can be found on websites around the world. Though no institution issues a degree in Clerical Abuse, Mr Nauheimer successfully survived advanced classes from the School of Intimidation and Slander sponsored by the NY Archdiocese. Both his and his family's degree of pain were acknowledged by a Grand Jury probing the issue of clergy abuse. He says his goals are the same as those stated by Pope Benedict XVI in Australia on July 19, 2008: "Victims should receive compassion and care, and those responsible for these evils must be brought to justice." <more>

American political spirituality… Over the next few week's it looks as though Tom McMahon is taking us on another excursion away from his Sacraments series. It's a useful excursion though looking at American spirituality amidst the coming Presidential election. Today he looks at the Democratic Convention. <more>

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

Brian Coyne
Editor and Publisher