I have one $10 off voucher for shopping at Fishpond for a minimum order over $40 to give away. It has to be used before 11.59pm tonight AEST. If anyone is thinking of making a purchase through the fishpond.com.au section of the Catholica Spiritual Marketplace [LINK] and you'd like $10 off today only email me quick [editor@catholica.com.au] and I'll send you the code you need to insert to claim this deduction. Sorry there is only one available and it will be first in best dressed.

Cheers,

I'm presently trying to put some package deals special to Catholica particularly for three books that have recently been featured in the discussions on Catholica. The deals hopefully will mainly help you save on postage and reduce the overall cost. Please be patient while I try and work out how to do this. The books I'm presently trying to package together in ways that save on postage are "The God Delusion" and "The Dawkins Delusion"; and another one packaging together "The Dawkins Delusion" and Denis Edwards book "How God Acts".

Hopefully I'll have something online within 24 hours from Monday 12 April 9.00pm.

Cheers,

The Amazon Shop is now online. My apologies that on the main index page there is a lot of blank space at the bottom. When you click on a specific item you will find this space quickly becomes filled with information about the books or other products.

I've torn my hair out trying to find ways of avoiding the seeming blank space on the index page but, unfortunately, it is a necessary inconvenience we have to put up with because of the interaction with the Amazon databases and how our site interacts with Amazon.

So far I've only uploaded 20 products but many more will be added over coming month.

Providing these different distributors in different parts of the world will enable you to get the best price on postage and packaging in your locality.

I'd very much appreciate suggestions of other items that you feel will be of especial interest to the sort of readership we are trying to serve here at Catholica.

Cheers,

Hopefully I've achieved success at last. What seems to have happened is that for some reason the entire database on our main forum got jumbled up. I do know the server crashed some days ago, not through any fault of ours, but that may have been when the jumble occurred.

As you've probably noticed each post has a unique number. Normally they should sit in the database starting at number 1 and going through to the last number in order — in our case to around 38,100 for the main forum. For some reason the order got jumbled up so, when searching the database, the computer was effectively having to do the equivalent of run from one end of town to the other and back again multiple times in order to display the pages of the forum correctly. That was placing a big load on the cpus (central processing units). That's the theory at least. I will have to wait 24 hours to confirm that absolutely. After much work I've tucked all the little buggers back in their neat little rows, and in the right order, and there should be no more jumping out of bed and upsetting the order of our dormitory. Fr Ted will undoubtedly be continuing with his rosary crusade to see Catholica crash — or for the little blighters to start acting up again and jumping around all over the dormitory.
Thanks for your patience. The main forum should be functioning normally again and I have transferred most of the entries you made on this forum over to the main forum.

Hopefully in time these forums in the marketplace will attract a community, or communities, of their own that compliment the community in the main forum.

Thanks for your patience. I'm pleased to report that this glitch does not seem to have any adverse impact at all on the overall traffic figures for Catholica in recent days.

Cheers,

I have my fingers crossed that I have solved the problem and propose to transfer the posts from this board back to the main board. In order to do that I need to take these forums off-line and will do so in five minutes at 0352 hrs AEDST.

Cheers,

Another of my memories of the old St Mary's Cathedral in Perth comes from the Jubilee Celebrations. I was responsible for media for the event in Perth and came up with an idea to get some large banners manufactured to display on the street poles of Perth. The archdiocese wasn't going to pay for it so we got the parishes to purchase the banners and the archdiocese borrowed them back for the period when they were hung in Adelaide and St George's Terrace. I also had an idea to drape three or four of them high up on the outer facade of the Cathedral. Unfortunately whenever I asked for money to do anything there never seemed to be any available. We really needed to hire one of those enormous sky cranes to undertake a job like this but that was out of the question so I conned a mate of mine, Todd Flanagan (now principal of an international school in Beijing) to climb up on the roof of the cathedral with my hammer drill and we'd insert the heavy anchors into the concrete that were needed to hold these banners securely and prevent them being blown away in any storm. We climbed up to around where I've put the yellow triangle on the photo above (except it was on the other side of the Cathedral) and I had to lean over a small parapet (not there now as what you see is part of the new roof) and balance precariously while I exerted enormous force on this hammer drill to try and drill 3/8 inch holes about 3 inches deep into pretty stubborn brickwork. Poor old Todd was nearly pooping his pants with fear at the height and I wasn't much better myself.

A few days later I returned to secure the two lower bolts but this time Todd wasn't going to be in it. I shudder to think of the work safety and insurance issues had this not worked out satisfactorily. The roof (again now gone and it was on the other side of the cathedral) was lower than where the yellow triangle is but seemingly steeper than the main roof. I had to crawl up on my back somehow and, in danger of constantly sliding off the roof because of the sweat I was generating, somehow make my way up to the wall of the Cathedral and again insert two of these heavy anchors. Somehow I managed to do it but I have to confess I was absolutely petrified the whole time I was up there. I still think it probably one of the most petrifying things I've done in my life and I was genuinely in enormous fear of sliding off the roof to my death or incapacitation on the concrete below.

Unfortunately I don't seem to be able to locate photos of those particular banners but here's a photo from my website of some of the lower banners on the Cathedral and flying in Adelaide Terrace. You can see what the full-size banners look like in this pdf of an ad we also ran in The West Australian at the time.

Cheers,

Church bells to ring climate alarm as faith joins science in Denmark

Geneva (ENI). When church bells start ringing in Copenhagen, and all around the world, on 13 December, they will not be heralding an early arrival of Christmas. Rather they will peal out a call to action and prayer to respond to impending climate change. More than 100 world political leaders, as well as faith leaders and supporters of action to deal with climate change are converging on the Danish capital. There a crucial United Nations meeting began on 7 December to set the international agenda on climate, so that the city can live with the nickname of "Hopenhagen" that it has been given by one group of campaigners. On 13 December before participating in a climate change service, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu and activists from around the world will present a global petition to Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. [864 words, ENI-09-0958]

Archbishop of Canterbury warns on election of U.S. lesbian bishop

New York (ENI). The election of an openly lesbian priest, who lives with her partner, as a bishop in the U.S. Episcopal (Anglican) Church is likely to cause further problems in the worldwide Anglican Communion, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, has said. "The election of Mary Glasspool by the diocese of Los Angeles as suffragan [assistant] bishop-elect raises very serious questions not just for the Episcopal Church and its place in the Anglican Communion, but for the Communion as a whole," said Williams, the leader of the 77-million Anglican Communion, in a 6 December statement. [419 words, ENI-09-0956]

Bishop urges Somalis, world not to give in to 'criminal' bombers

Nairobi (ENI). The Somali people and the international community should do all they can to resist "the criminals" responsible for a bomb blast in Mogadishu that killed at least 23 people, including students, government ministers and journalists on 3 December says a Christian leader in the mainly Muslim country. Roman Catholic Bishop Georgio Bertin, the Apostolic Administrator of Mogadishu and the whole of Somalia told Ecumenical News International on 4 December, "What happened yesterday is very bad and very serious." He added, "However Somali authorities, the Somalia people and the international community should not surrender themselves into the hands of few criminals. We must resist them. It is the time of courage and perseverance in fighting evil." [485 words, ENI-09-0955]

Muslim's autobiography wins Grawemeyer religion award

Washington DC (ENI/RNS). Eboo Patel, founder and executive director of the community service group Interfaith Youth Core, has become the first Muslim to win the prestigious Grawemeyer Award in Religion from the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary and the University of Louisville. Patel, 34, is a member of the White House's Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships and the Religious Advisory Committee of the Council on Foreign Relations. His interfaith organization, launched in 1998 and based in Chicago, is now active at about 75 college campuses, Religion News Service reports. [337 words, ENI-09-0957]

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http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/worries-over-popes-health-as-xmas-midnig...

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120872731&ft=1&f=1016

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/11/26/world/main5788035.shtml

http://ncronline.org/node/16078

This is a presidential address by Terrence Tilley of Fordham Uni to the Cath. Theological Society of America on ‘Three impasses in Christology’. Numerous contributors here – especially those following accounts of the making of fourth century theology – will find this of very considerable interest. Predictably Tilley is already under attack from a local watchdog of orthodoxy: the very reaction Tilley argues makes for the perversion of theology.

The Editorial Board is reflecting on the content, tone and concerns expressed by ++Egan in depositions and comparing them unfavorably to those of ++Martin of Dublin.

++Martin gets enormous respect from me as the only heirarch I know of who has responded to the abuses from the heart of compassion. +Egan's approach is much more typical and defensive.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/07/opinion/07mon2.html?ref=todayspaper

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/06/AR2009120602192.html

Dear all,

I am sorry to report our technical problem is still without solution. The load on the cpus has increased to 89% in the latest update despite my attempts yesterday to strip down quite a number of things that I thought may have been causing the server to overload and to make the main forum read only.

I am considering radical surgery to remove a large section of the archive from the database and store it off-site temporarily to see if that brings about an improvement in the next 24 hours.

Reading the technical blogs, other people have experienced similar frustrations with other types of forum software and it is a pain in the butt when it erupts. There is nothing obvious showing up in the log files of who is accessing our site that gives any immediate indication of a particular activity that has suddenly caused the server to overload. We also don't appear to be the subject of any malicious or denial of service attacks. What is happening appears to still have a mysterious cause. Despite our problems with the forum the number of visits to Catholica was maintained yesterday (Monday) with 1502 — that's about bang on average for weekday visits these days — and ironically the bandwidth (the total of information downloaded to users computers) was slightly lower than normal. At present then the overloading is not causing the site to actually crash or slow.

Again my apologies for this disruption to our normal operations and please feel free to continue the conversation on this forum.

I know that it is Jesus Birthday soon, but it is the death of Jesus which hurts me so. He suffered so much for me, look at His crown of thorns, the nails in His hands and feet and the sword in His loving Heart. What I went through is nothing.

Please Jesus, take from me this blackness, which enfolds me, to be forever, in the sight of the devil, who is always waiting for me and who is keeping me in this state of unforgivingness, so he can control my thoughts. The devil will not win Jesus, while you are here with me. Please take this form of hate, which I have of the abuse, which was done to me, so as I can see you in a better light of Love.

The loneliness of not forgiving them, is keeping me away from you and I so want to be close to you again, as I was with you when I was a child. I need you so much Jesus, that I can not see through my own pain, what you had done for me. Please forgive me Jesus, for not loving you enough, to gain the strength from you and for not forgiving those who had done these things to me. I see your pain Dear Jesus and I have made your cross so heavy with my sins, in the way, I have not forgiven these people. I want to take your pain away Dear Jesus, and I can by first forgiving these people in your name to God, You know Jesus, I cry with sadness today, because I see what I caused you, to suffer so much for me.

I am so sorry Jesus for letting you down and because I had come to you many times over these years and asked for help, but some how, it was never the right help or love that I had asked you for, until today. And I ask you with Love to help me to forgive them as you forgive them Jesus. Could we be friends again Jesus, I have missed you so much and I do love you. Ann

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