Survey to show success of parish life
Parishes are being encouraged next month to participate in a national survey that will give a wider perspective on church life in New Zealand.
Category: Uncategorized
1967 development encyclical’s message ever fresh
Some 30 people braved severe Wellington elements on 30 June to celebrate this landmark document. The group reflected on the international social climate in the context of which the encyclical was published, had some insights into Populorum Progressio, made some social comparisons in development between the 1960s and now, and finally considered the question, what can we do in 2007 to further the aims of this encyclical?
Votive candle table set up
St Mary’s Whanganui has recently set up a table beside the statue of Our Lady for votive candles which is proving very popular.
19th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year C
College students master university theology
The paper: Religion, Ethics and Law in a Secular Society, extended the knowledge of the six Year 13s from St Mary’s College, into the fields of philosophy, theology, ethics, and politics and introduced them to a range of great thinkers such as Descartes, Sartre, Rousseau, Hobbes, Newbigin and O’Donovan.
Heavens above!
On 15 August we celebrate the feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary to heaven. Sr Elizabeth Julian ponders the implications of this bodily assumption.
Editorial: in the land of plenty
Today’s gospel reading draws attention to a subject dear to many hearts over the past month’”economic survival or profit. As I write (31 July) senior hospital specialists are negotiating with their employers for more attractive pay and conditions to stop an exodus of doctors across the Tasman.
Investing in the young
Proud to be lay in collaborative ministry
Barbara Rowley of St Bernadette’s Parish, Naenae, is celebrating her first year of officially being appointed as lay pastoral leader working in relationship with St Michael’s Parish, Taita. Barbara partially agrees with John Kleinsman (Getting to know the lay of the land) on the negative connotations of the word ‘lay’ but, she says, these are changing as more people become involved in the church.
Getting to know the lay of the land
It strikes me that it is hard to escape the fact that the term ‘lay’ has pejorative overtones; he or she is ‘just’ a lay person. Consider also the following dictionary definitions: A lay-by is a portion of road widened to permit a vehicle to stop without interfering with the main flow of traffic; a lay shaft is a secondary shaft of a machine not forming part of the main system of power-transmission; a lay figure is ‘a jointed wooden figure for arranging drapery on etc; unimportant person, nonentity;