Saturday, 04 April 2009

Join us for a party...

Dear Friends,

In a month's time we will celebrate the 1000th edition of Catholica. I only worked out a few days ago that it coincides with the social get-together we are planning at the Shalom House of Prayer, Carcoar, on 4th May. At the bottom of this page you'll find a link to a page explaining more and where you can book to be part of this party.

For our lead commentary today I'm extending this series looking at what the future character of the Church might look like. I'm both exploring what it's likely to look like if things continue along the pathway they've been on for so long and how it might look if we changed out tactics a little. Today I turn from discussion of what the objectives of the spiritual quest are to consideration of more practical issues. If we are to rebuild an effective Church we firstly need some consensus or agreement on what we're trying to communicate, then we need some agreement about our methodologies in how we get the message across.
<Read today's lead commentary>
www.catholica.com.au/gc0/bc2/051_bc_040409.php

The cost of Cathedrals and some deeper questions... There's no lead commentary today but today's email brings news of a huge cost blowout for the refurbishment of St Mary's Cathedral in Perth. That leads on to some deeper questions posed by the editor of Catholica. <more>

The relationship between the letter and spirit of the law... One of the great beauties — and the tensions — in Catholic thought is the relationship between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. So often we find in the parables and examples of Jesus' life itself examples where the Teacher himself sought to draw out the relationship. His disciple, Paul, perhaps more than any other, was the one who made this insight most clear. Dr Ian Elmer's commentary today seeks to explore more deeply this relationship between letter and spirit in Law in the thinking of St Paul. <more>

The Middle Ages… The reality is societal attitudes change to many things as time unwinds and our knowledge changes. In today's commentary Tom McMahon is looking at how people looked upon marriage in the Middle Ages - and the changing attitudes within the clerical and monastic classes which were driven perhaps more from their own self-interests than any concern for the married. This is only an introduction to a period which Tom sees as crucial in forming attitudes that we still carry less as a heritage and more as a legacy today. <more>

Lenten Reflection 4: How do we cleanse ourselves of religious hypocrisy? That's essentially the message of today's Lenten reflection by Dr Andrew Kania based on the thinking of St John Chrysostom. You can find the passage from Matthew (15:1-19) on the USCCB website HERE. <more>

13.3: Where did the idea of Purgatory spring from? Today's excerpt from Tom Lee's manuscript starts out unpromisingly by mentioning a Pope we know almost nothing about, Urban I. Don't be put off by that though, in this 1300 or so words he packs in some important history surrounding the name of Origen, Tertullian and Hippolytus. Where did we get our ideas about Purgatory from? Who left us a record of the earliest liturgies? Find out today. <more>

Video reports from the Catalyst Forum… Undoubtedly helped by the Cardinal Archbishop of Sydney's decision to ban this meeting from being held on Catholic Church property, the organisation Catalyst for Renewal held an enormously enthusiastic one day intensive forum at the Salvation Army Congress Hall in Sydney on Saturday, 28th March 2009, to discuss Bishop Geoffrey Robinson's provocative book Confronting Power and Sex in the Catholic Church — Reclaiming the Spirit of Jesus. This book has generated extraordinary interest around the world and has now clocked up 20,000 sales according to the publisher. The editor of Catholica, Brian Coyne, attended the Catalyst Forum with video camera and today presents some edited highlights of the Forum on the Catholica YouTube channel. <more>

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

Brian Coyne
Editor and Publisher