The Record Newspaper - 04 April 2012

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April 4, 2012, The Record

PARISH ROUND-UP Stabat Mater Dolorosa, but beautiful too

Lumen Christi’s art achievements

Claremont church and school harmonise

LUMEN Christi College in Gosnells recently congratulated its Class of 2011 Music students who gained entry to the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts: Jessica Hope, Samantha Craig and Pamela Barrett. As places for each course are limited and highly sought after, students can be suitably proud of their achievements. Rehearsals, costumes and sets are all well under way for the college’s production of Peter Pan to be performed in Week 2, Term 3. Contact Lumen Christi directly on 9394 9300 for further detail.

Fr Charles Waddell is happy to report there is not only “harmony but cooperative joy” between the Calremont parish and school. Two years ago, the school underwent massive reconstruction and teachers and children used church and presbytery facilities. Now, the presbytery is being renovated, resulting in parish secretary Kim Peretti sharing an office with school secretary Jan Odgers. The result is a happier, more efficient administration and children who excel academically and socially. The children are also well ‘churched’ with a weekly Mass attendance rate of 25-35 per cent, high by today’s standards.

Ukrainian Church to renovate and restore A RESTORATION fund has been organised for church renovations.

This is separate to the yearly upkeep (podatok) fund. If you wish to donate, please see Mr Basil Czwerenczuk or call the church office on 9271 4711. The church building is in need of repairs which is why the Parish Council is asking for your support.

The total to date is $5,793.

Mrs Newman excels at Good Shepherd GOOD Shepherd Catholic Primary School teacher Mrs Diana Newman has been recognised through the Catholic Education Awards of Excellence for her work in the Bidjara Project. Started in 2011, this project formalised the educational use of the school’s unique environment and animals. Principal

Rally for marriage

A soloist sings the Stabat Mater, a choral work about the sorrows of Mary, at St Mary’s Cathedral in Perth pior to the 11am Mass on 25 March.

PHOTO: FR R CROSS Gabrielle Doyle wrote in the school newsletter: “It is wonderful to see our Catholic Education System recognise excellence in teaching and I congratulate Mrs Newman on this well deserved award … which includes a trophy, certificate and $5,000 for the program.”

Emmanuel Centre reaches out

Bellambi, NSW in mid-March for formation on how to be actors of change, in leadership, engagement of young people and advocates for the YCW and community. Guest Bishop Justin Bianchini said, “The role of young people as a follower of Jesus is in their life and world they live in; it is living the mission of Jesus which is the mission of the Church”. A major action arising from the gathering was the AYCW’s development of the ‘Just work isn’t JUST work’ campaign. For more information on the AYCW, go to email info@ycw.org.au or call Melanie on 0448 557 331.

AYCW following Jesus and mission of Church Leaders from the Perth branch of Australian Young Christian Workers Movement (YCW) joined others in

Each week, during school terms, many programs are offered on a Monday and Tuesday at the Emmanuel Centre, locayed at 25 Windsor Street, Perth. They include sessions on learning about the body, items of current interest, scrapbooking and reading.

These programs are free because volunteers generously give their time and talents. If you would like further information, please contact 9328 8113.

SAINT OF THE WEEK

READINGS OF THE WEEK Sunday 8th - White EASTER SUNDAY MASS 1st Reading: Acts 10:34,37-43 Peter addresses Cornelius Responsorial Ps 117:1-2,16-17,22-23 Psalm Love without end 2nd Reading: Col 3:1-4 Life with Christ Gospel Reading: Jn 20:1-9 Understanding draws

Blessed Michael Rua 1837-1910 April 6

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As a youth in Turin, Italy, Michael was drawn to the work and vision of St. John Bosco, his school’s chaplain. In 1854 he helped Don Bosco found the Salesian Congregation, dedicated to practical charity and inspired by St. Francis de Sales. After his ordination in 1860, Michael personally assisted Don Bosco, becoming his vicar in 1865. Following Don Bosco’s death in 1888, Michael led the congregation, sending missionaries to 23 countries. By the time he died in 1910, the congregation had grown to 341 houses and 4,000 members. He was beatified in 1972.

Monday 9th - White EASTER MONDAY 1st Reading: Acts 2:14,22-23

God raised Jesus Responsorial Ps 15:1-2,5,7-11 Psalm: My hearts rejoices Gospel Reading: Mt 28:8-15

Our risen Lord appears

SaintsLIve yOUR

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Tuesday 10th - White EASTER TUESDAY 1st Reading: Acts 2:36-41

Jesus is Lord and Christ Responsorial Ps 32:4-5,18-20,22 Psalm: The Lord’s word is

faithful Gospel Reading: Jn 20:11-18

Why are you weeping?

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Eugen Mattes Contributors Debbie Warrier Karen and Derek Boylen Christopher West Bronia Karniewicz Bernard Toutounji Ben Sacks

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Former Wimbledon great, Pastor Margaret Court, will be one of two speakers at a rally in defence of traditional marriage, to be held on April 24. Federal Parliament is currently considering legislation aimed at changing the definition of marriage to include homosexual unions. The Rally chairman is Rabbi Dr Shalom Coleman. Bill Muehlenberg, author of Strained Relations: The Challenge of Homosexuality, columnist and former National Secretary of the AFA, will also be speaking. The rally will be held at the Victory Life Centre, corner Neil St and Frobisher Rd, Osborne Park at 6.30pm for 7pm. Tea and coffee will be available. Contact wa@ family.org.au for further details.

Please submit your news to: parishes@therecord.com.au or schools@therecord.com.au

Wednesday 11th - White EASTER WEDNESDAY 1st Reading: Acts 3:1-10

No silver, no gold

Responsorial Psalm: Gospel Reading:

Ps 104:1-4,6-9 The Lord is our God Pk 24:13-35 Burning hearts

Thursday 12th - White EASTER THURSDAY 1st Reading: Acts 3:11-26

Heirs of the prophets Responsorial Ps 8:2,5-9 Psalms: You gave humanity

power Gospel Reading: Lk 21:1-14

Peace be with you!

Friday 13th - White EASTER FRIDAY 1st Reading: Acts 4:1-12

Peter and John are

arrested Responsorial Ps 117:1-2,4,22-27 Psalm: The Lord is good Gospel Reading: Jn 21:1-14

It is the lord Saturday 14th - White EASTER SATURDAY 1st Reading: Acts 4:13-21

Peter and John are

warned Responsorial Ps117:1,14-21 Psalm: Give thanks to the Lord Gospel Reading: Mk 16:9-15

Proclaim the good News!

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Catholic clarity for complex times CATHOLIC families and those searching for truth need resources to help them negotiate the complexities of modern life, many of which are also active challenges to the desire of parents to lead their children to an encounter with the beauty of the Church. At The Record’s bookshop you can find great books for the family at good prices.

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April 4, 2012, The Record

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Get over it: access trumps aesthetics says priest

By Sarah Motherwell CHAPLAIN for the hard of hearing and the deaf, Fr Paul Pitzen, says priests need to get over aesthetics of the sanctuary of a church and look at providing Powerpoint captions for parishioners.

Fr Paul has held his chaplaincy since 1977 and says due to WA’s isolation, not all the deaf know how to sign. “Some go deaf later in life and know nothing about signing but are still part of the flock,” he said.

According to a 1998 study, the South Australian Department of Human Services estimated more than 16 per cent of the Australian population over the age of 15 suffer from hearing loss greater than 25 decibels - slightly quieter than the sound of a whisper.

Hearing loss is measured in decibels and some people can experience hearing loss at specific frequencies.

It is difficult to determine exactly how many people have hearing

problems because there is no specific counting system in place in Australia.

Fr Paul says parishioners should have the option of powerpoint captions during Mass but some priests think they can upset the sanctuary.

“What would Jesus do - would he be concerned about the aesthetics or the communications,” Fr Paul said.

With an increasingly ageing population, Fr Paul says a great proportion of the population will

suffer from partial or full hearing loss and to evangelise, the word of the gospel needs to be spread without aesthetics.

“The Gospel is to be proclaimed - that’s good in theory but if you’re deaf then how is it going to be proclaimed? It has to be proclaimed visually.”

Fr Paul says at St Denis Church they use powerpoint slides with, “40 point whole caps that can be read at the back of the church without straining.”

He also suggested that powerpoints could be used to aid those with eyesight problems.

Hearing loss in children is another area of concern with a 2004 report by Australian Hearing estimating there were more than 11,000 deaf and hearing-impaired children in Australia.

If you need help with your hearing or want more information on how to make your Church more hearing impaired friendly, please contact Fr Paul on 0401 016 399.

Above, children participate and present the offertory gifts to Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB at a Mass marking the Day of the Unborn Child.

PHOTO: FR ROBERT CROSS

Friends of the unborn child keep the faith

By Robert Hiini CATHOLICS and Christians turned out in force for a special Mass marking the Day of the Unborn Child on Saturday, March 24.

The 10am Mass was held at St Mary’s Cathedral and attended by those on the front-line in the pro-

McCarthy tipped to be next Ambassador to Holy See

By Robert Hiini REPORTS have emerged in the secular media that John McCarthy QC will be appointed as Australia’s next Ambassador to the Holy See. Senior political reporter for The Age newspaper, Michelle Grattan, made the report on March 28, naming Mr McCarthy, senior counsel for NSW Labor for about 20 years, as the candidate to fill the vacancy left by the previous ambassador, Tim Fischer.

The foreign affairs department refused to confirm the report, saying an appointment was yet to be made. “We have no visibility of that at the moment,” a media representative said. “It’s at the minister’s discretion and subject to (the) procedures that have to be worked through.”

Mr McCarthy was reported as being a close personal friend of foreign affairs minister and former New South Wales Premier Bob Carr. He was reported as a specialist in Native Title and was a one time adviser to the Catholic,

JOHN HUGHES

life movement, prayer-supporters and priests from throughout the Archdiocese.

Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB was the main celebrant and homilist.

The Mass was advertised as part of the 40 Days for Life campaign – a global movement praying for the recognition of the sancitity of

human life, with daily prayers outside abortion clinics.

The Day of the Unborn Child is celebrated on or around the traditional Feast Day of the Annunciation, marking the angel’s advice to Mary that she would conceive, celebrated nine months before Christmas Day. Pregnancy Assistance: 9328 2929

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Mr McCarthy at the Sesquicentenary Senate Dinner held in 2001.

PHOTO: ONLINE SOURCE

former independent Senator from Tasmania, Brian Harradine.

It was reported the McCarthys have one son who is a priest in the Archdiocese of Sydney.

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April 4, 2012, The Record

Mark wins mother of awards

By Sarah Motherwell

THE winner of the 2012 Parents and Friends Federation of WA (PFFWA) Principal award has been described as a man who always works to benefit the lives of his students.

The principal of Mater Christi Catholic Primary School in Yangebup, Mark de Kluyver, received the award at a conference dinner at the WACA on March 23.

The PFFWA is an independent body for parents of children in Catholic schools. Mr de Kluyver said he was unaware that the presi-

dent of the school’s P&F, Marina Hayward, had nominated him.

“I don’t expect people to do things like that; I was touched to receive it, be nominated and to win it,” he said.

“What was important to me was the appreciation of my unwavering commitment to having children at the centre of the decisions we make at our school.”

In her nomination, Mrs Hayward recognised Mr de Kluyver’s active involvement in all community buildings and social functions the P&F hosts and praised him for his attempts to reach out to all families.

“He constantly comes back to ‘remember that we are here for the benefit of our children’,” she said in the letter.

“He always ensures the main focus of what is being achieved is focusing on gaining maximum accountability to and benefit for the Mater Christi school children.”

Mater Christi Catholic Primary School has 700 students from kindergarten through to Year 6, or one per cent of the Catholic school population in Western Australia.

Principal Mark de Kluyver, recognised by the P&F. PHOTO: MATER CHRISTI

Props in the parliament for Catholic outreach ABORIGINAL advocacy organisation Daydawn and the poverty relief centre Shopfront have been recognised as two of former Archbishop Barry Hickey’s achievements in parliament this month.

The member of Girrawheen, Margaret Quirk, made a statement to State parliament on March 22, acknowledging Archbishop Hickey’s contribution.

She highlighted Daydawn and Shopfront as two lesser-known initiatives of the outgoing Archbishop and their beneficial practices in helping marginalised members of society.

“At a time of acute shortages of affordable housing, the work of Daydawn is especially valuable and needed by a group that cannot readily access rental accommodation because of poverty, bureaucratic barriers or, sadly, racism,” she said.

“Shopfront in Maylands, which is staffed mainly by volunteers, offers practical assistance and some immediate help to those marginalised through homelessness, unemployment, violence, depression or addictions.”

Ms Quirk also welcomed Timothy Costelloe to the role of the new Catholic Archbishop of Perth.

The Faith Centre’s Lydia Stanley, centre, with husband John and Archdiocesan Media Officer Bridget Spinks.

PHOTO: FAYANN D’SOUZA

There be success for new evangelisation

By Robert Hiini

14th Station Notre Dame's Holy Spirit Chapel (Artist: Peter Schipperheyn)

He is Risen The University of Notre Dame Australia wishes everyone in the community a

Joyful, Blessed and Peaceful Easter 9433 0533 or future@nd.edu.au

www.nd.edu.au

THE more of a saint you are, the more of a human being you are, Fr Richard Abourjaily told filmgoers at The Faith Centre’s first ever film screening on March 25.

Around 150 people turned out at Hoyts Booragoon to watch the US-made There Be Dragons, based on the life of Opus Dei founder, St Josemaria Escriva.

“Sanctity is attractive even to those who are not believers because the more of a saint you are, the more of a human being you are,” Fr Abourjaily said.

“Holiness enables us to become who we are truly meant to be.”

The event came hot on the heels of the Centre’s announcement last month of a Bible study course by correspondence, headed up by Br Joe Murphy cfc, with future film events expected later on this year.

“This is our first major cul-

tural event, in the realm of New Evangelisation,” Fr Abourjaily told The Record. “(It’s) about the Faith in dialogue, in conversation, with the wider culture.”

There Be Dragons is one of many faith-themed films out in cinemas recently. Emilio Estevez’s The Way, about a father trekking the Santiago de Compostela after the death of his son, is in US cinemas now, as is October Baby, the story of a woman who discovers she survived an abortion and goes in search of her birth mother.

For Greater Glory, a film exploring the story of the ‘Cristeros’ who fought against anti-Christian persecution in Mexico from 19261929, will be released on June 1 in the US and stars Andy Garcia, Eva Longoria and Peter O’Toole. It was the most expensive film ever made in Mexico and was recently shown by its producers to a select audience

in Rome. There is no news on an Australian release date.

Future Faith Centre events will be announced on their website at www.thefaith.org.au and via their Facebook and Twitter pages.

Charlie Cox portrays Father Josemaria Escriva de Balaguer, in the film There Be Dragons.

PHOTO: CNS

April 4, 2012, The Record

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Greenwood marks Divine Mercy feast

By Mark Reidy WHEN Greenwood parishioner Charles O’Donnell was introduced to Divine Mercy Sunday ten years ago, he knew he had discovered a spiritual gold mine and his desire to share these riches with others will culminate with the inaugural celebration of the feast day at the All Saints Parish on April 15.

Divine Mercy Sunday was officially announced by Pope John Paul II on April 30, 2000 during the canonisation of St Faustina Kowalska, a Polish religious sister who received numerous revelations from Jesus from 1925 until her death, at 33, in 1938.

These revelations, which she recorded in her 600 page diary, included Jesus’ words, “I desire that the first Sunday after Easter be the Feast of Mercy”.

The celebration has gathered momentum across the globe, providing the opportunity for the faithful to receive a plenary indulgence, granted by the Church to those who

participate in the prayers and devotions.

Mr O’Donnell said that All Saints was joining a growing list of parishes across Perth sharing in the immense treasures revealed to St Faustina.

The committee he heads has handed out hundreds of pamphlets over the past few weeks explaining the spiritual significance of Divine Mercy Sunday, which will include exposition of the Eucharist at 2.30pm and be followed by benediction and Mass at 3pm.

Mr O’Donnell, however, emphasised that the Sunday devotions were only a portion of the legacy that Jesus imparted to his humble servant.

“There is so much to learn from the revelations of St Faustina”, he said For any enquiries regarding Divine Mercy Sunday in Greenwood, contact Charles on 0416 226 943. For more information on the Divine Mercy, go to www.divinemercy.com.au.

Archbishop Coleridge off to Brisbane THE President of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference Archbishop Philip Wilson welcomed the appointment of Archbishop Mark Benedict Coleridge as Metropolitan Archbishop of Brisbane after its announcement last Monday evening.

Archbishop Coleridge has served as the chief pastor of the Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn since 2006.

Archbishop Coleridge replaces Archbishop John Alexius Bathersby who retired last year after serving the people of Brisbane since 1992.

Archbishop Wilson said today that he was delighted with the appointment of Archbishop Coleridge and extended his heartfelt prayers to the Archbishop and the people of the Archdiocese.

“Archbishop Coleridge is an exceptionally talented pastor and will show solid leadership to the people of Brisbane. He has a great many gifts and wonderful human qualities. I will pray for him and the people of the Archdiocese in the coming weeks”, said Archbishop Wilson.

Media spokesperson for the Archdiocese of Melbourne, and foundation President of the Forum of Australian Catholic Institutes of Theology.

Appointed to Rome in 1997, Archbishop Mark worked in the Holy See’s Secretariat of State and was Chaplain to the late Pope John Paul II. He is currently Chair

Archbishop Coleridge was Chaplain to Pope John Paul II.

Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Canberra Goulburn has been appointed Archbishop of Brisbane.

Archbishop Mark Coleridge was appointed the Archbishop of Canberra and Goulburn in 2006, after spending some years as Auxiliary Bishop of Melbourne.

Archbishop Mark has held posts as Master of Catholic Theological College, Melbourne;

of the Roman Missal Editorial Committee and the International Commission for the Preparation of an English-language Lectionary.

He chairs the Australian Bishops’ Commission for Liturgy and is a member of the Bishops’ Commission for Doctrine and Morals. He is also a member of the Pontifical Council for Culture.

He has recently been appointed to the Pontifical Council for Social Communications.

Archbishop Coleridge will be installed on 11 May at St Stephen’s Cathedral in Brisbane.

Schools could be pro-life highway: Pell

By Robert Hiini THE fastest and easiest way of addressing the growing number of abortions and extra-marital births is through schools and teachers, Sydney’s Cardinal George Pell told teaching students at Notre Dame’s Sydney campus recently.

“As Christians, we believe that God is interested in each one of us and that he has a plan for each one of us,” Cardinal Pell said.

“Education is the greatest gift you

can give to our evolving society, to our children, not just for tomorrow, but for the day after tomorrow. The passport to the future is education.”

“Human freedom means that we can go in all sorts of directions but if you can get yourself into the right niche, and find a job that you really enjoy doing, it’s an enormous blessing. I think it’s only a minority of people who really like what they are doing professionally, and I think an incredible percentage of those people are teachers.”

Aussie saint rebranded

The new logo of Mary MacKillop Place.

MARY MacKillop Place, dubbed ‘Australia’s National Shrine’ in honour of St Mary of the Cross MacKillop, has rebranded.

The Sisters of St Joseph of the Sacred Heart announced the news on their website on March 21, showing the new logo and the new slogan for the MMP: “Out of the Ordinary”.

The logo is similar to that which is still used by the religious order Mary MacKillop founded.

“St Mary MacKillop was an ordinary person who lived an extraordinary life. An unconventional life that saw her triumph over adversities and obstacles placed in her way,” the sosj.org.au website posting said.

“She truly was a woman who lived her life out of the ordinary.”

The post spruiks MMP’s confer-

PHOTO: ONLINE SOURCE

ence and accommodation facilities as “not what you would expect ... at a living holy site”.

MMP is the motherhouse of the Josephite Order founded in Penola, South Australia in 1866 by St Mary of the Cross MacKillop and English priest Fr Julian E Tenison Woods.

Josephite Sister Anne Derwin with Pope Benedict in 2008.

PHOTO: CNS

The students listened to Cardinal Pell’s address and had the opportunity to ask questions about Catholicism, teaching in Catholic schools and the Church’s stance on a variety of current issues.

Professor Marguerite Maher, Dean of the School of Education, said she felt privileged to welcome a new cohort of students to the school who has already displayed a passion for education.

“I find it exciting to tap into your enthusiasm, your energy and your

idealism about children and teaching,” Professor Maher said.

Professor Margot Kearns, Pro Vice Chancellor Academic, said the Cardinal’s annual commitment to speak to new Education students was just one way in which he supported the University.

“Seven years ago, if you asked a Sydneysider about Notre Dame University, only a few would know that there was a University of Notre Dame Australia in Fremantle and it had been there for 19 years,”

Professor Kearns said. “We’ve now got 4,200 students enrolled on the Sydney campus and that didn’t happen by chance, it happened because people with vision gave us a lot of support.

That support came in large parts from His Eminence. We thank the Cardinal for his financial support, for his sharing of wisdom and guidance, for showing us great leadership and for sharing his insights into education. We hope the Cardinal is proud of what we are doing here.”

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April 4, 2012, The Record

Embargo an unfair burden: Pope HAVANA - Preparing to leave Cuba at the end of a three-day pastoral visit, Pope Benedict XVI made his first reference to the US embargo of the island and the embargo’s impact on the country’s poor.

All Cubans need to work together to build a renewed and reconciled society, but progress is difficult given a “lack of material resources, a situation which is worsened when restrictive economic measures, imposed from outside the country, unfairly burden its people,” the pope said on March 28 during his official farewell ceremony. He did not mention the United States by name.

The Vatican has repeatedly criticised the US embargo as a measure that has not forced Cuba’s communist government to respect human rights. Instead, the embargo has had a devastating effect on the quality of life of the Cuban people, especially the poor.

The pope said that peaceful coexistence requires individuals and nations to “reject immovable positions and unilateral viewpoints, which tend to make understanding more difficult and efforts at cooperation ineffective.”

“Patience and sincere dialogue” are necessary, he said.

Before departing from Havana’s

Ladies get no respect from regime

Take the shackles off your feet, El Papa is here

HAVANA - Cuban police arrested and held members of a Catholic human rights group for several hours on March 28, preventing them from attending an outdoor morning Mass celebrated by Pope Benedict XVI. Alejandrina Garcia de la Rivas and Laura Maria Labrada Pollan, members of the Ladies in White “Damas de Blanco” - were arrested before 6 am on March 28, said Blanca Reyes, a member of the organisation who now lives Madrid.

Garcia later said they were taken to a military prison outside Havana, where they were photographed, fingerprinted and weighed, then were returned to Labrada’s home.

The previous evening, Garcia and Labrada had given an interview to Catholic News Service at Labrada’s home in the city’s Old Havana neighborhood.

The Ladies in White, relatives of former political prisoners, march every Sunday after Mass at Havana’s St Rita of Cascia Church to protest human rights violations.

The organisation originated to protest the 2003 imprisonment of 75 Cubans connected to the Varela Project, an initiative promoting free elections and other political reforms. Those people and more than 50 others were released in 2011 under a deal brokered by Havana’s Cardinal Jaime Ortega Alamino. Most of those released went into exile abroad.

Members are frequently arrested and released in less than 24 hours.

They also have been attacked by what they say are governmentcontrolled mobs.

Several members have said they were warned not to attend the pope’s liturgies in the cities of Santiago de Cuba and Havana.

Jose Marti International Airport for his return flight to Rome, Pope Benedict told government officials and the Cuban public that he was convinced that, wherever Jesus Christ is present, “discouragement yields to hope, goodness dispels uncertainties and a powerful force opens up the horizon to beneficial and unexpected possibilities.”

He said he hoped his presence in Cuba would strengthen those who “with perseverance and selfsacrifice” carry out the work of evangelization.

And he said he hoped no Cuban would feel excluded from taking up the “exciting search for his or her

basic freedoms” or feel excused from the challenge because they lack energy or resources.

While the pope said his message was motivated by faith and the desire to share it, he insisted that societies themselves are better off when people are free to profess their faith and when faith-based schools and social services are allowed to operate.

He prayed that the light of faith would shine on Cuba, helping people “to foster social harmony and to allow the blossoming of all that is finest in the Cuban soul, its most noble values, which can be the basis for building a society of broad

vision, renewed and reconciled.”

Several miles off the main road leading to the airport were lined with crowds several people deep.

A few waved Vatican or Cuban flags, but they did not demonstrate the wild enthusiasm shown for the pope’s motorcade in Mexico just a few days earlier.

Civilians with their backs to the road provided crowd control as the pope passed by in the popemobile and it began to rain.

Although the pope’s stay in Cuba was drawing to an end, he said he would continue praying that the country would make progress in justice and fraternity.

Father Luis Eduardo Rodriguez of Venezuela receives a kiss from tourist-welcoming worker Rosa in front of the cathedral in Havana, Cuba on March 24. Pope Benedict visited Cuba from March 26-28.

PHOTO: CNS/REUTERS

Catholic flair masks untold pagan belief SANTIAGO DE CUBA, Cuba - In this Caribbean nation of 11.3 million, one of the greatest challenges to Catholic evangelisation comes from Cubans who practice traditional African religions.

The fusion of diverse spiritual currents was occurring even before the Catholic Church began expanding throughout the world. When colonisers brought Christianity to the New World, it was expected that other religious systems would adhere to the mother Church.

In recent decades, however, the church’s vision on this matter has been adjusted. The new approach has been inculturation of local populations. It is a process of welcoming traditional popular reli-

gious expressions and focusing on a gradual transition toward full communion via evangelisation.

In Cuba, this syncretism of mostly animist African religions mixed with mainstream Catholicism is popular, said Jesuit Father Juan Rovira, who considers himself an “avid student” of popular devotion.

“The only real contact we have with them is when they come to church,” said Father Rovira, pastor of Holy Family Parish is Santiago de Cuba.

He told Catholic News Service on March 29 that most popular devotees come to see him only when they need baptisms, funerals and a few other services. But he also said that some of them are very

much in contact with priests. Most are required to be baptised in the Catholic Church before they can be baptised in their syncretic groups, he added. When Pope Benedict XVI visited Santiago de Cuba on March 26-27, some Cubans wore traditional African attire.

“Those seen at the papal events in their particular dress most likely were not there out of piety,” said Father Rovira. “So, I doubt the visit had any noticeable impact on them.”

He said Santeria, which identifies Catholic saints with African deities, is more openly seen in Havana. His last stay at the capital city coincided with the round-theisland pilgrimage of an image of

Our Lady of Charity of El Cobre, Cuba’s patroness.

“I spent close to seven hours working the blessing lines, and many of the participants were clearly ‘santeros’ (Santeria members), wearing their garb, multicolored beaded necklaces, and all,” he remarked.

Father Raul Rodriguez Dago, a lecturer on Afro-Cuban religions at San Carlos and San Ambrosio Seminary in Havana and author of “El Santero Cubano,” considers syncretic devotees a large part of the Cuban Catholic Church.

“Evangelisation must be based on respect and should consider their values in order to open them to the Gospel with patience and

perseverance, taking into account their degree of closeness to the church.” Father Rodriguez’s position has been widely supported by the Catholic Church. However, Father Rovira explained that evangelisation among syncretic devotees has been very difficult.

“This type of effort is a ‘pending task’ for us,” he said. “These are small cells of unknown levels of relationship among themselves and with the church,” and spread across the country.

Asked why people need to combine different types of religions, Father Rovira explained: “It is said they have concrete problems in life for which they find no church solutions.”

April 4, 2012, The Record

Page 7

American bishops issue new rite for unborn life WASHINGTON - Just in time for Mother’s Day, US Catholics parishes will be able to celebrate the new Rite for the Blessing of a Child in the Womb.

The Vatican has given its approval to publication in English and Spanish of the new rite, which was approved by the US bishops in November 2008.

The blessing will be printed in both languages in a combined booklet.

“I can think of no better day to announce this news than on the feast of the Annunciation, when

we remember Mary’s ‘yes’ to God and the incarnation of that child in her womb that saved the world,” said Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston.

The blessing was prepared to support parents awaiting the birth of their child, to encourage parish prayers for and recognition of the gift of the child in the womb, and to foster respect for human life within society. It can be offered within the context of Mass as well as outside of Mass, and for an individual mother, a couple or a group of expectant parents. “We wanted to make this

Gladness as stem cell conference is canned

Freedom is the issue say protestors

VATICAN CITY - A Vaticansponsored congress on the ethical use of stem cells in scientific research was canceled because of a lack of funding, organisers said.

The Third International Congress on Responsible Stem Cell Research was to be held April 25-28 at the Vatican and was being organised by the Pontifical Academy for Life with the collaboration of the Vaticanbased International Federation of Catholic Medical Associations, the Jerome Lejeune Foundation and the Bioethical Consultative Committee of Monaco.

Father Scott Borgman, an official at the Pontifical Academy for Life, told Catholic News Service on March 27 that there were not enough sponsors or registrations to be able to cover costs.

“It was just a matter of numbers; we were short thousands of euros to be able to carry this through” and academy staffers had exhausted all efforts over the past three months to find new sources of funding, he said.

The president of the Catholic medical federation, Jose Simon Castellvi, told CNS by email that it was “a pity, but economic problems” and too many Vatican-based conferences on stem cells being scheduled too close together had led to the March 23 cancellation of the congress.

In November, the Pontifical Council for Culture, partnered with NeoStem Inc, a US company researching and marketing adult stem-cell therapies, sponsored a similar conference on adult stem cells with many of the same speakers who were scheduled to attend the late-April event.

And the Pontifical Academy of Sciences was holding a closed-door working group on April 16-17 on new developments in stem-cell research. Three members of the life academy told news outlets they were pleased the conference was canceled because they opposed the attendance of speakers who work with embryonic stem cells and support their use in medical research.

One academy member told CNS “it was opportune to cancel the April planned congress” because it must be shown that research on adult stem cells is “much more promising” than the research coming out of experiments done with embryonic stem cells.

The member, Mgr Michel Schooyans, a retired professor of theology and philosophy at the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium, told CNS in an email exchange that he was “not directly part of the group of members of the Pontifical Academy for Life who called for the cancellation.”

announcement as soon as possible so that parishes might begin to look at how this blessing might be woven into the fabric of parish life,” said Archbishop Gregory Aymond of New Orleans, chairman of the USCCB Committee on Divine Worship.

The blessing originated when then-Bishop Joseph Kurtz asked the pro-life committee to see if such a blessing existed. When none was found, the committee prepared a text and submitted it to the divine worship committee in March 2008.

The blessing includes interces-

sions “for our government and civic leaders that they may perform their duties with justice and compassion while respecting the gift of human life” and “for a safe and healthy pregnancy for all expectant mothers and for a safe delivery for their children.”

It also expresses concern “for children who are unwanted, unloved, abandoned or abused, that the Lord will inspire his people to protect and care for them.”

If used as a blessing outside Mass, the service includes introductory prayers, Scripture readings,

Dan Cumberledge, a parishioner of Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary Church in Brockport, NY, holds a Rosary and a sign as he takes part in a local event outside the Federal Building in Rochester, NY, on March 23 that was part of a nationwide “Stand Up for Religious Freedom” rally.

PHOTO: CNS/MIKE CRUPI

intercessions, the actual blessing of the mother and child, and a concluding rite.

“May almighty God, who has created new life, now bless the child in your womb,” the blessing says.

“The Lord has brought you the joy of motherhood: May he bless you with a safe and healthy pregnancy.

You thank the Lord today for the gift of your child: May he bring you and your child one day to share in the unending joys of heaven.”

There are also optional prayers for fathers, for families and for the parish community.

Court takes liberties with US religious freedom WASHINGTON - Religiously based restrictions on reproductive health services for victims of human trafficking cannot be imposed by the Department of Health and Human Services, a federal judge has ruled.

By delegating to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops the decision on which services to offer or not offer to trafficking victims, HHS violated the Establishment Clause of the Constitution, Judge Richard Stearns ruled on March 23 in the case filed by the American Civil Liberties Union in federal court in Massachusetts.

A USCCB spokeswoman called the ruling a disappointment on March 26. “The decision seems to ignore the right of free expression of one’s religious beliefs,” said Mercy Sister Mary Ann Walsh, USCCB director of media relations.

“It’s very likely that we would appeal,” she said, adding that the conference’s general counsel continued to review the ruling March 26.

Jennifer Dalven, director of the ACLU’s Reproductive Freedom Project, welcomed Stearns’ decision.

“We all have the right to our own religious beliefs, but under the Constitution an organisation can’t use federal funds to impose those beliefs on others,” Dalven told CNS on March 27.

The government was wrong to authorise the USCCB to deliver only those services it deemed appropriate under Catholic teaching, she added.

“In this case, the court said that an organisation administering a taxpayer-funded program to help human trafficking victims can’t deny this vulnerable population critical health services based on the organisation’s religious beliefs,” Dalven said.

The ACLU filed the lawsuit in 2009 after learning that HHS officials allowed the USCCB, through its Migration and Refugee Services department, to limit the scope of case management services provided under a five-year contract to assist trafficking victims. First signed in 2006, the contract permitted the USCCB to restrict offering specific reproductive health services - such as abortion, providing contraceptives and sterilisation - on religious grounds even though the government’s original request for proposals to administer the program did not impose any such restrictions.

Stearns agreed with the ACLU’s contention that HHS violated its constitutional obligations by delegating discretion to the USCCB on which services would or would not be provided.

Page 8

April 4, 2012, The Record

Schools: How Catholic are we ?

ROCHESTER, NY (CNS) The Rochester-based Catholic Education Foundation has initiated a program to help Catholic grade schools and high schools evaluate their Catholic identity.

Called the Catholic School Identity Assessment, it is a diagnostic tool to help schools spot their strengths and weaknesses, according to Father Peter Stravinskas, the foundation’s executive director.

“Catholic identity in Catholic schools was taken for granted when the faculty and administrators were almost exclusively clergy and religious,” he said, but “with the heavy involvement of lay teachers and administrators that has not always been a given.”

The assessment was originally created for Catholic high schools and then last year some pastors and principals said they wanted something like that for their grade schools, the priest said in a recent interview with Catholic News Service.

“That the identity issue would not be addressed sufficiently is not malevolence,” Father Stravinskas said. Rather, it often results because some lay administrators and teachers “either never went to Catholic school themselves,” he said, or they attended “in an era when Catholic identity was waning.”

He said the foundation’s assessment tool is an opportunity to discuss the subject. “Even just by

asking the questions, one already has started to address the identity issue,” he said.

Fr Stravinskas said the process starts with a self-assessment by the school. Next comes an onsite visitation by a team of three or five people put together by the foundation (team size depends on the school’s size). Team members visit classrooms; interview students, faculty and parents; observe interactions at the school; and write up an evaluation.

“Atmosphere, mood, attitudes, like charity” are among what a team will observe at a school, he told CNS. Teams also consider the physical environment, look for Catholic art on display, gauge the

reaction of students to the presence of clergy and religious and see whether prayer is a normal part of school life, “not simply at a once-amonth Mass.” “Is there Catholic ‘air’ in the institution,” he said.

When he leads workshops about the identity issue and talks about the assessment tool, he finds “no resistance to increased Catholic identity” and is in fact greeted with “enthusiasm for it.”

“If the Catholic identity is not there, we have no right to be in business - it’s deceptive advertising,” he added. Principal Joseph Skerjanec of St Anthony Catholic School in Sterling, Colorado, which is in the Denver Archdiocese, said in a statement that through the

foundation’s assessment tool, “we were able to identify our areas of strength and our areas in which we need to grow.”

It helped “us in expressing our Catholic identity” and a detailed follow-up prompted the school to develop a new Catholic Lay Leadership Formation Program for all parish and school employees, Skerjanec said.

“Measurable standards offer the best hope for benchmarking, influencing and strengthening a vibrant recognisable Catholic identity within our schools, which is why our diocese is embarking on this program,” said Charles Taylor, superintendent of Catholic schools in the Diocese of Gaylord.

No need to keep on trucking alone FORISTELL, Missouri (CNS) - The truck driver sat at the restaurant counter, happy to have someone to talk with at the end of a long day.

A Protestant, he goes to church about five times a year, mostly because he’s not at home very often.

He works for a good company, one that is concerned for his safety and will pay him if the weather is too bad for him to drive. Once, when working for another company, he was in an accident in freezing rain that involved 110 trucks and 11 deaths.

It’s difficult for many truckers to put safety first, with pressures on them to go as many miles as possible and be on schedule, he noted.

The trucker’s conversation with Deacon Richard Seveska also touched on how the challenges of being away from home made his personal life much more difficult.

A while back, his mother had fallen, and there was no one there to help her. He eventually had to find a nursing home for her. Making medical decisions for her was compounded by his long absences.

“So how do you handle all this?”

Deacon Seveska asked, listening and later handing the man a prayer card as he patted him on the back.

Deacon Seveska and his wife, Kathleen, moved to Foristell from the Chicago area in 2010 and he has a part-time parish assignment.

His passion the last dozen years has been what is known as truck-stop ministry.

The deacon spends evenings saying hello to the truck drivers, identifying himself as a chaplain and asking basic questions.

“I just say, ‘Hey, let’s sit down and talk,’ and before long they are talking. It’s just amazing the conversations they get into. It’s a tough life that they live,” he told the St Louis Review, newspaper of the St Louis Archdiocese.

“They realise, here’s a minister who’s taking the time to listen and is not judgmental. Then they’ll talk about their faith and what they really believe.” He called the visits a two-way sharing, “and we both walk away fulfilled. I had a trucker one night say, ‘Rich, this is not a meeting of two people. It’s a meeting of two souls.’”

There’s no stereotypical truck driver, he said, though they are almost always male, with some couples out on the road together. An increasing number of truck drivers had jobs in “corporate America” and left to seek a job where they have a little more freedom.

“There’s a lot more depth to them than I thought,” Deacon Seveska said. “I didn’t know anything about the trucking industry.

But it’s about people. When you sit

Deacon Rich Seveska, left, talks with trucker Bill Delbridge at a truck-stop diner in Foristell, Missouri.

down and shut up and listen, it’s amazing what you learn.” Tommy Gee, a truck driver from Oxford, Alabama, who has been on the job 20 years, noted that he appreciated visiting with Deacon Seveska.

“I’ve been in a truck all day listening to the radio and talking to myself. I can talk your ears off,” he said. Bernie Czebatul, who drives throughout the United States and

PHOTO: CNS

quick to tell you what’s really going on, even when they don’t have much of a religious background,” Deacon Seveska said. Sometimes he will pray with people, and sometimes they will take the lead. One time a guy at the counter said, “Hey, Rev, you want to say a prayer?”

Assured by the man that it was a serious request, Deacon Seveska began to pray and “everybody at the

A guy at the counter said “Hey Rev, you want to say a prayer?” Everyone at the counter got into it. western Canada, said his only opportunity to converse with someone is when he is in touch with a dispatcher. “I will talk to the Lord in my private time,” he said.

One of the biggest challenges truckers face is their role as a longdistance parent or spouse. Deacon Seveska has met truckers who have been away from home as long as two years, while it’s common for them to be gone three months at a time. Also not surprising is to find truckers who have been married three or four times.

“There’s a number of problems you run into. It could be money, kids, spouse, drugs, alcohol, suicidal thoughts, you name it. They’re

counter got into it,” the deacon said.

The truck-stop ministry follows a similar ministry at airports and hospitals, which routinely have chaplains, and is supported by the US bishops.

Deacons see the ministry as “being church to people on the move,” those who have little or no time to be part of a typical faith community. The aim is to offer comfort, understanding and support to truckers in a difficult job.

The ministry is a natural one for followers of Jesus, Deacon Seveska said. “A couple thousand years ago there was a guy who just spent time with people. We’re just doing the same thing.”

Deacon Rich Seveska talks with trucker Abdi Rizak from Minneapolis at a truck stop parking lot in Foristel.

PHOTO: CNS

April 4, 2012, The Record

Page 9

Easter 2012

These days of holiness can turn our eyes to him

By Bishop Donald Sproxton

A

This season is the time of hope.

Risen

As we celebrate Easter, we can all look forward to receiving Christ’s Spirit, enabling us to draw on his courage, his fidelity and his commitment in the events of our daily lives, writes Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB.

M

y recent installation as the new Catholic Archbishop of Perth was a deeply moving occasion for me and, I suspect, for many others as well. One of the things which struck me very forcibly was the extraordinary generosity and

Jesus is not just a great figure from the past: he is alive and with us today. This is what the resurrection means. He accompanies us in our journey through life. commitment of so many people who worked together to make the event the success it was.

Generosity and commitment are two qualities which are universally admired. We would all like to be thought of as people of this kind, even if we have a sneaking suspi-

cion that we actually still have a long way to go.

Indeed, human experience teaches that for most of us there is quite a gap between our ideals and the reality of our lives. However, as long as we keep our ideals alive and keep on trying to reach them, we are able to live with a sense of hope.

For Christians, this hope is grounded in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Certainly,

his life of generosity, self-sacrifice, compassion and love provides us with an inspiring example.

His willingness to remain faithful to his ideals even in the face of death confirms his courage and fidelity. But good example alone is not enough. In fact, it may even be a source of discouragement as we realise how often we fail to follow this example in our lives. It is easy to give up in despair.

It is the resurrection of Jesus which gives solid ground to our hope. Jesus is not just a great figure from the past: he is alive and with us today. This is what the resurrection means. Through his presence in our lives, we can draw on his courage, fidelity and commitment when our own fails. He accompanies us in our journey through life and strengthens us with his grace.

May the Spirit of Jesus fill you and your loved ones as we celebrate the great feast of Easter. + Most Rev Timothy Costelloe SDB ARCHBISHOP OF PERTH Easter messages of of WA’s other bishops - pages 12 and 13

PHOTO: 123RF

great milestone was reached last Sunday for the Catholics of Ellenbrook. They gathered to consecrate their new parish church, under the patronage of St Helena of the Holy Cross. There was great excitement as Archbishop Timothy Costelloe arrived to his first official engagement. Everyone was keen to meet him and he was to remark that this church and parish would have a special place in his heart, as it was his first service for the Archdiocese.

The people were also expectant as they looked forward to the celebrations of Holy Week for the first time in their church.

They must have felt the special intercession of their patroness, St Helena. This will be shared with the growing number of parishioners who will join the community, as this part of the metropolitan area expands, and they learn of the remarkable Helena, mother of the first Christian Roman emperor.

Holy Week brings to an end the Lenten period of personal prayer and spiritual renewal for Christians.

We are ready to celebrate the events of our redemption from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday. I place the emphasis on our redemption because it is personal, we have been saved. Easter has always been that special occasion for us to celebrate the way we share in Christ’s victory over sin and eternal death.

In the early Church, Easter was the only feast. The Church celebrated nothing else. Easter was called the Pascha of Jesus, the

Bishop Sproxton displays the papal appointment of Archbishop Costelloe.

PHOTOS: MICHAEL CONNELLY

Passover of Jesus, and it began to be celebrated annually throughout the Church before the end of the second century. Previously, the Passover of Jesus was celebrated weekly.

We can thank St Helena and others for the separating out of the events of Holy Week. Her son, Constantine, commissioned the circular basilica on the site of the tomb where the body of Jesus was laid. Not far away is the site of Calvary and, as work continued on the building of an open air courtyard around it, Helena found the remains of the true cross. The separate liturgy of Good Friday developed as did the Washing of the Feet and the Institution of the Eucharist.

We are able today to celebrate these events in a more measured way. Each day of Holy Week can be savoured and our reflection on the enormous love of God for us can fill us with confidence and joy.

I pray for that spiritual renewal we have longed for as we travelled through Lent. May everyone find their strength in Christ to be transformed in heart and to live with faith.

It is with this prayer that I wish you every blessing of peace, love and joy at Easter. + Bishop Donald Sproxton

Page 10

April 4, 2012, The Record

Two different

The real significance of sex In a move highlighting how seriously they view the issue, Victoria’s Catholic bishops circulated 80,000 letters through Victorian parishes last weekend urging parishioners to write to their MPs, asking them to defend marriage as being between a man and a woman (see breakout box below). The idea of same-sex marriage seems both reasonable and tolerant to many people. But, as US academic J Budziszewski writes, there is a meaning to sexual difference which no other kind of relationship can replace or equal.

All they who serve are telling me Of Your unnumbered graces; And all wound me more and more, And something leaves me dying, I know not what, of which they are darkly speaking.

— John of the Cross, Spiritual Canticle

H

ow many more colours there are in the world because there are two sexes and not just one!

How amusing they are to each other, and yet how baffling!

Mutual perplexity can be part of the fun, a fountain of mirth, making the shimmering hues of strangeness sparkle all the more. In our day, though, perplexity isn’t so amusing; it has an edge to it. We see all those colours all right, but admitting to the sight is considered shameful and offensive. Just as some ages have held it loutish to work with one’s hands, so our time holds it crude to make use of one’s eyes. So we make ourselves a little blind. We squint, throw dust in our eyes, and try not to look at things straight on.

A well-socialised young woman whom we may call Carissa had been reading some of the classics for the first time. One day when we were talking, she asked a question which all well-socialised young women who are reading the classics for the first time are expected to ask these days. Why did those bygone writers speak as though men and women are different?

“Maybe because they are different,” I said. “Don’t you think so?”

Plainly annoyed by my answer, she demanded, “Weren’t those old views just prejudices?”

“Well, it’s not easy to disentangle the prejudices of one’s own time and place from universal truth. Maybe none of those writers did disentangle them perfectly. Still,” I said, “aren’t certain differences between men and women acknowledged everywhere?”

“But men and women aren’t different.”

“Then why do you think every culture supposes that they are?”

“Oh, I know the sexes end up different everywhere,” she said. “But that only happens because boys are raised differently than girls.”

“Let me be sure I follow you. You don’t deny that some sex differences are universal — “ “No.” “ — but you say they aren’t natural. The only reason for them is dif-

ferences in how boys and girls are brought up.”

“That’s right.”

“Let’s think about that. To produce the same differences between boys and girls everywhere, those differences in upbringing would also have to be the same everywhere, wouldn’t they?”

“Yes. Boys are always raised differently than girls.”

“And yet you think these differences in upbringing have no basis in human nature.”

“Right, because they don’t.”

“If they have no basis in human nature, then why are they universal?”

“What do you mean?”

“If they are merely arbitrary, wouldn’t you expect them to vary from culture to culture?”

“No, because cultures influence each other.”

“You mean cultures that raise boys and girls differently influence other cultures to raise them differently?”

“Of course.”

“Why shouldn’t it be the other way around? If it’s all because of culture, then why don’t some cultures raise boys and girls the same, and influence other cultures to follow them?”

“I don’t understand you.”

“To put the question another way,” I asked, “if the pattern of upbringing has no basis in human nature, then why is it so persistent?”

Carissa dodged the question, instead protesting an opinion I hadn’t expressed. “Aren’t men and women equally human?”

“Equally human, sure, but not the same. Complementary variations on the same musical theme. Different voices singing in polyphony.”

“Tell me one fundamental difference between men and women,” she demanded.

“That’s easy. I could never bear a child. A woman can.”

“Not all women. Aren’t some women infertile?”

“Sure, but you’re confusing essence with accident,” I said. “A fertile woman can bear a child, but not even a fertile man can pull off a feat like that.”

By now Carissa was thoroughly exasperated. Hurling down her trump card, she exclaimed, “I know men’s and women’s bodies are different, but in their brains they’re just the same.”

The details fade from memory, so I may have slightly misquoted some of Carissa’s words. Not the words of her final sentence, which have echoed in my mind ever since. This chapter is not about brain science.

Nonetheless, let us pause to consider what is known about men’s and women’s brains.

“In their brains,” it turns out, men and women are different after all.

According to neuroscientist Larry Cahill, the differences are marked, pervasive, and consistent.[1] The cliché that variation within each sex is greater than variation between the sexes is simply false.

Moreover, the contrasts between men and women are evident not just in a few extreme cases, but across the whole distribution, and they involve not only the activity of the brain, but also its organisation and development.

Doreen Kimura, another brain scientist, remarks that although environment certainly influences us, the differences in brain organisation occur “so early in life that from the start the environment is acting on

Praise for fresh approach “I teach a course on ‘Philosophy of Human Sexuality,’ and I must have read fifty to a hundred books on the topic. On the Meaning of Sex is, quite simply, number one, especially for this generation. It is deep yet clear, reverent yet punchy, sound yet relevant, idealistic yet realistic, thoughtful yet exciting. It makes boredom impossible. The style is as beautiful as the content.”

- PETER KREEFT Interested? On the Meaning of Sex can be ordered from The Record Bookshop by calling (08) 9220 5900 or via: bookshop@therecord.com.au.

differently wired brains in boys and girls.”[2] How many are these differences in wiring? Legion. To mention just a few: Large parts of the brain cortex are thicker in women than in men.

Ratios of gray to white matter vary, too. The hippocampus, which plays a role in memory and spatial navigation, takes up a greater proportion of the female brain than of the male brain. On the other hand, the CA1 region of the hippocampus is larger in the male. A variety of neurotransmitter systems work differently in men and women; neurotransmitters are the chemicals that carry nerve impulses across the synapses.

Sex hormones, obviously different in men and women, influence not only the excitability of hippocampus cells but also various aspects of their structure. The right and left hemispheres are more interconnected in female brains than in male ones, and the corpus callosum, which links them together, is larger. The amygdala, involved in emotion and emotional memory, is larger in men, but the deep limbic system, which is also involved in emotion, is larger in women.

Across a spectrum of different functions, which side of the amygdala controls which function is reversed in men and women.

Sex-related differences between the hemispheres exist for other brain regions as well, including the prefrontal cortex involved in personality, cognition and other executive functions, and the hypothalamus, which links the nervous system with the endocrine system and has some connection with maternal behaviour. External circumstances, such as chronic stress, act on male brains differently than on female.

Brain diseases also diverge in men and women, not only in their frequency but in their age of onset, duration and the way they manifest themselves. Even the neurological aspects of addiction differ between the two sexes.

Although not all neurological differences are associated with behavioural differences, the differences between male and female brains affect numerous aspects of behaviour, including “emotion, memory, vision, hearing, processing faces, pain perception, navigation, neurotransmitter levels, stress hormone action on the brain, and disease”.

Cahill says that “the picture of brain organisation that emerges is of two

complex mosaics — one male and one female — that are similar in many respects but very different in others. The way that information is processed through the two mosaics, and the behaviours that each produce, could be identical or strikingly different, depending on a host of parameters.” He concludes with a quotation from a report of the medical branch of the National Academy of Sciences: “Sex does matter. It matters in ways that we did not expect.

Bishops urge fa Archbishop of Melbourne Denis Hart and five other bishops sent out 80,000 letters last weekend asking parishioners to take a stand against proposed new laws and influence politicians' vote on gay marriage, reports the Herald Sun. Sale Bishop Christopher Prowse, one of the signatories to the letter, said the Church's directive was about highlighting the "true meaning of marriage".

"At this stage (the debate) is about same-sex marriage, but next it might be

April 4, 2012, The Record

Page 11

A faith that's rooted in real joy and happiness Reviewed by Michael Jaques Between Heaven and Mirth

By James Martin SJ Published by Harper One

M

any years ago the Bishop of Bunbury, My l e s Mc Ke on , came to Collie for Confirmation. He preached for somewhat longer than the usual 10 minutes and when he said, “Well, I suppose I should stop talking”, a loud voice from the congregation called out “In the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen”.

I later heard Bishop McKeon tell that story against himself, still amused by it. Many similar stories are to be found in this enjoyable book, which recognises that there is a serious side to life, that there are times when we are certainly unhappy and sad, but that we need to balance this with joy and happiness in our faith.

When distributing Communion and called on to give a blessing, I would hold my right hand outstretched over the forehead and say, “May Almighty God bless you”.

Once, a small boy tried to ‘highfive’ me – laughter in church!

The further into this book I read, the more encouraged I began to feel in my faith. I am far from perfect: I am a sinner but God’s attention is not on that alone: it never has been. Psalm 149 tells us: “For the Lord takes delight in his people: He crowns the humble with salvation”.

This book takes me out of myself: it allows me to see the familiar in a different light. All our lives we have been reminded, constantly, that God loves us. Of course: that’s what God does. God is love. But, God likes me? God delights in me? We don’t usually think about the relationship in that way and Fr Martin urges us to do so.

PHOTO: 123RF.COM

Undoubtedly, it matters in ways that we have not yet begun to imagine.”[3] So Carissa had it exactly backwards. It seems our brains are even more different than the rest of our bodies. Why is it so hard even to discuss the differences between the sexes? I think because we miss four large truths.

One of these large truths might be called the duality of nature.

Manhood and womanhood reflect the same human nature, and with

equal fidelity and dignity, but they reflect different facets of it. There are two ways to get this matter wrong.

One way is to think that because the two sexes are different, they must be unequally valuable — woman an inferior version of man, or man an inferior version of woman. The other way is to think that because the sexes do have equal worth, they must be exactly the same.

Another large truth is the duality of path. The developmental trajec-

aithful to lobby for marriage polygamy," Bishop Prowse said.

The bishops argue the foundation of marriage is the sexual difference between men and women and the "potential for new life".

"Without this, there would be no human beings and no future," the letter says.

"Bringing new human life into the world is founded on the loving union in difference of male and female. Children are best nurtured by a mother and father."

Labor's Stephen Jones and Greens MP

Adam Bandt have put forward amendments to the Marriage Act. An inquiry into the Bill allows Australians to answer questions online, including whether they agree that same-sex marriage should be legalised.

About 54 per cent of 65,000 Australians who have completed the online survey supported the change.

The bishops asked their parishioners to vote in that online survey.

- CATHNEWS

tories of men and women are different at both ends — not only in what they start with, the susceptibilities and tendencies that each sex must discipline and prune, but in what they end with, what each sex ripens into when all goes as it should. Some people miss the point by ignoring the difference in starting points as though the difference between the raw materials from which maturity is built were unimportant. That is like thinking that a house can float above its foundations.

The above article is an excerpt from the second chapter of J Budziszewski's book On the Meaning of Sex (Downer’s Grove, IL: Intercollegiate Studies Institute, 2012). Reprinted with permission from the author and the Intercollegiate Studies Institute.

All rights reserved.

Endnotes: 1. Larry Cahill, “Why Sex Matters for Neuroscience,” Nature Reviews: Neuroscience 7 (2006), 477-84.

See also Larry Cahill, “His Brain, Her Brain”, Scientific American 292, no 5 (2005): 40-47.

2. Doreen Kimura, “Sex Differences in the Brain”, Scientific American 267, no 3 (1992): 119-25.

3. Cahill, “Why Sex Matters for Neuroscience.”

The author J Budziszewski earned his doctorate from Yale University in 1981. He teaches at the University of Texas in Austin, in the Departments of Government and Philosophy where he specialises in the relations among ethical theory, political theory and Christian theology. The focus of his current research is natural law and moral self deception. He is a former atheist, former political radical, former shipyard welder, and former lots of other things, including former young and former thin.

He’s been married for more than 30 years to his high school sweetheart, Sandra, and has two daughters. He loves teaching. He says he also loves contemporary music, but it turns out he means “the contemporaries of Johann Sebastian Bach”. He deserted his faith during college but returned to Christ a dozen years later and entered the Catholic Church at Easter 2004.

Among a number of other books, he is the author of On the Meaning of Sex, The Line Through the Heart: Natural Law as Fact, Theory, and Sign of Contradiction, Ask Me Anything: Provocative Answers for College Students, Ask Me Anything 2: More Provocative Answers for College Students, How to Stay Christian in College, What We Can’t Not Know: A Guide, The Revenge of Conscience: Politics and the Fall of Man, and Written on the Heart: The Case for Natural Law.

He quotes St Therese of Avila: “A sad nun is a bad nun” and Isaiah 62.4: “… you shall be called ‘My Delight’”. I like his proposal that St Francis of Assisi said, “Preach the Gospel at all times. Use words when necessary”, and I recognised the truth of his discussion of the importance of humour in marriage: “Our marriages are only as good as our histories of our laughter together” and, “Perhaps the person who ‘gets’ our jokes the best is the one with whom we have shared the most!” The fact that my wife can say that she loves me, because I make her laugh! is a reflection of all that Fr Martin is writing about.

I enjoyed this book. It’s easy and entertaining to read; it is thoughtprovoking and, above all, it is an encouragement to your faith in God.

Page 12

April 4, 2012, The Record

HUNGERING FOR

OBLIVION A blockbuster book series becomes a blockbuster film. But is The Hunger Games prophetic of an increasingly godless world? asks Fr Robert Barron.

W

hen I was a junior in high school, I read Shirley Jackson’s great short story The Lottery, and I will confess that her narrative still haunts me.

You might remember the plot.

The townspeople of a village in the American heartland are gathering on a beautiful summer day in late June for a festival. There is good food, lively conversation and upbeat music. It becomes clear that the focus for this celebration is the annual lottery, and the reader naturally assumes that the winner of the lottery will receive a prize of some kind.

But when the choice is made, the “winner” shrinks away in fear, protesting the injustice of it all, while her fellow citizens close in on her, rocks and stones in hand. As the story ends, they are upon her.

In mediaeval Mexico, the Aztecs would choose a particularly hand-

some and brave warrior from a rival tribe. For a year, they would wine and dine him, provide entertainment for him, and treat him like a celebrity. Then, at the close of the year, they would lead him to the top of a tall pyramid and rip his stillbeating heart from his chest and offer it to the gods.

In the arenas of ancient Rome — most famously in the Colosseum — young gladiators would engage in mortal combat for the entertainment of blood-thirsty mobs, and emperors would use these spectacles for cynical political purposes.

In the mythological story of Theseus and the Minotaur, we hear that the king of Crete obligated the king of Athens every year to send seven young men and seven young women to battle the Minotaur, who was hidden in a devilishly complex maze. No one survived the ordeal, until Theseus managed to outwit the monster and escape from the maze. All of

these examples of human sacrifice — both fictional and non-fictional — swirled through my head as I watched the much-anticipated film The Hunger Games, based on the wildly popular series of novels.

As in Jackson’s story, a lottery results in the choice of sacrificial victims from each “district” of a post-apocalyptic North American nation state. These youngsters

Why has the motif of the sacrificial victim played such a large role in human imagination for so long?

— they must be teenagers — are then taken to the capital city and, like the Aztecs’ prisoners, they are pampered, made-up, and treated as celebrities for an extended period.

Next, they are compelled to engage in mortal combat so that, of the 24 participants, only one will survive.

Like the Roman crowds of old, the people of the nation watch this process unfold and find it deeply entertaining, while the leadership manipulates the games (and the people’s feelings) for their own political ends.

Finally, two of the participants in the Hunger Games (they changed the rules a bit) play the role of Theseus and manage to survive their ordeal and thus call into question the games themselves.

The really interesting question is this: Why has this motif of the sacrificial victim played such a large role in the human imagination for so long? Why do we keep acting out this scenario, both in reality and in our literature?

The contemporary literary theorist Rene Girard has speculated that practically every human community is grounded in what he calls “the

scapegoating mechanism.” This is the process by which we discharge our societal tensions onto a victim whom we have decided, collectively, to punish.

In this, we effectively (at least for a time) manage to bring some peace and stability to our always volatile communities — which goes a long way toward explaining why the scapegoat dynamic is so popular with governments and why it

Discover the God who saves, EASTER: REDISCOVERING WHO WE ARE

T

HESE days, it is all too easy to lose touch with ourselves. Daily life seems to be getting faster; economic and social pressures seem to be greater; demands seem to be on the increase.

So often we react to challenges because we don’t have time to think things through. We find ourselves over-stressed and conflicted.

Signs of people losing themselves Who does not know people whose marriages have not sustained the pressures of modern life?

Children who have emotional and other personal problems? Others who suffer from addictions to drugs, alcohol, gambling or porn?

These are just some signs of people losing touch with themselves today. They will continue as Australian social trends make it harder for people to know themselves.

Easter reminds us of who we really are. Its message invites us to reflect on the meaning of our experiences as human beings.

Why do people love?

Love and goodness are part of daily life. Tired parents care for a crying child; married people have daily routines to help each other; grandparents encourage grandchildren; children care for age-

Bishop Holohan ing parents. Work colleagues are friendly and honest; acquaintances give lifts. People seek reconciliation after arguments; teenagers often reflect personal ideals and a deep sense of justice. There are endless routine ways people reveal love and do good.

In every parish and community, there are those who can be counted on always. Then there are the many who do voluntary work in organi-

we suffer low self esteem. We love ourselves because we are blind to our likeness to God. Social beings No one can love and do good in a vacuum. Hence, we are also social beings. Without others, we could not develop our potential to love and do good. We are social beings because our nature was created to reflect the community of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Why do people do wrong?

For all our efforts to love, we struggle against selfishness.

Resentments can frustrate efforts to forgive; judgementalism, our efforts to be compassionate; and weaknesses in the face of temptations makes it impossible for us to do always what is good.

Human beings, on their own, cannot overcome selfishness, temptations and original sin. sations. Goodness is revealed too when people try to love and to do good, even if they don’t succeed; when they do wrong, and later regret it. There could be no regret for wrongdoing without inner goodness.

Why do we reflect love?

People reflect love and goodness because our nature was created in God’s image and likeness. Human nature was created to reflect God’s infinite love and goodness. There is untapped potential to love and do good in all of us. Many take for granted times when they reflect God because ours is a materialistic society. We tend to compare ourselves to others to the extent that

Why do we struggle?

‘When people look into their own hearts, they find that they are divided within’ [1– Vatican II: Gaudium et Spes 13]. The source of this division is what St Paul calls ‘death’. This is the result of the ‘original sin’ of our first parents. They chose to do what they wanted rather than to obey God [2 – Genesis 3].

Human beings in touch with their hearts cannot be happy while doing wrong.

Who among us has never wished they could change or regretted acts of selfishness. Who has not regretted giving into temptation. These are the wishes of people who sense they have lost themselves to some

extent: they have not behaved as they sensed they could.

Basic yearnings of the human heart Who has not admired others and wished we could be more like them. We admire those who care for the poor and needy; put themselves out for others; stand for truth and justice against peer and social pressures and show great courage in times of adversity.

When we admire such qualities in others, we sense that we too should be like them. We would feel more ‘whole’ if we could be.

Reflective people recognise that human beings, on their own, cannot overcome selfishness, temptations or any of the other effects of original sin. They realise their need for help from someone greater – God. It is the Saviour who would heal the division with human beings, who would free them to live increasingly in the image of God. Jesus Christ is Saviour!

Jesus Christ, the Son of God, came among us to share with us his own divine life. Jesus taught us how to strengthen the divine within us.

As we do so, love grows and selfishness declines; goodness strengthens, and temptations weaken; forgiveness grows, and resentments and hurts are healed. We become more ‘whole’.

God’s life grows within us if we pray, worship and keep striving daily to live as Jesus taught. Many ask: ‘Why do Catholics have to go to Mass every Sunday?’ They forget the words of Jesus [5 – John 6:53]: If you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, you have no life in you.

HEART & MIND EASTER – PART AND PARCEL OF OUR LIVES

A

T A RECENT seminar on the Sacraments, participants viewed a DVD called Journey of the Universe. It gives much information about the size and ever expanding universe with billons of galaxies. It spoke about such lofty realities of our ever expanding universe in down-toearth terms.

The end result was to be filled with wonder and awe at God’s creation. The more we appreciate God at work in creation and nature, the more we can appreciate the God/ Man, Jesus, at work, not only in the Sacraments, but in the seasons/celebrations of the liturgical year. For example, the natural elements of water, bread, wine and oil have such a privileged position in our close relationship with God through the Sacraments.

Sadly, the celebration of Easter in the southern hemisphere is somewhat deprived of the visual display of nature that assists those in the northern hemisphere to enter into the season. Those in the north have passed from winter to spring. The more severe the winter, the more appreciated is spring. The more evident also is the power and beauty of new life bursting forth in nature.

Very apt for the Easter season where we celebrate Jesus bursting forth

April 4, 2012, The Record

Page 13

Left, the 16-year-old character of Katniss Everdeen who is selected to fight to the death in a post-apocalyptic world.

PHOTO: CNS

is usually given a quasi-religious sanction.

If you doubt Girard on this score, I would invite you to take a good, long look at what Hitler accomplished through his scapegoating of Jews — and at what most of us accomplish through gossip and back-stabbing.

As a wag once put it: “wherever two or three are gathered, look for victims.”

Girard discovered something else, which, despite his Catholic upbringing, took him quite by surprise. He found that Christianity was the one religion, philosophy, or ideology that both unmasked this scapegoat mechanism and showed a way out.

For, at the heart of Christian revelation, is God’s utter identification, not with the perpetrators of violence, but with the scapegoated

victim. The crucified Jesus is hence the undermining of the dynamic that has undergirded most civilisations and that continues to beguile the human imagination to this day.

If we find stories like The Lottery and The Hunger Games disturbing, it is due to our at least implicitly Christian formation.

Human sacrifice flourished in the midst of some of the most sophisticated and intellectually

advanced civilisations in history. It is demonstrably the case, and not just a matter of speculation, that what brought it to an end in both the Roman and Aztec contexts was nothing other than the influence of Christianity, the religion centred on a crucified Lord.

What haunted me as I watched The Hunger Games was that the instinct for human sacrifice is never far from the surface and that

it could easily exist alongside tremendous cultural and technological sophistication. I suspect this film is disturbingly prophetic. We might comfort ourselves with the thought that such things could never happen here but, as we in the West enter increasingly into a secular, post-Christian cultural space, we place ourselves in danger of reverting to wicked forms of behaviour and social organisation.

the Saviour who is with us Bishop Bianchini from the tomb in the Resurrection.

We in the southern hemisphere are capable, though, of using our imaginations. We have experienced many seasons of spring ourselves and can therefore draw on those memories. This helps us in some way appreciate the Paschal Mystery – the deep and profound reality of Jesus passing from death to life.

Our memories of spring are not the only good tool to aid our apprecia-

The more severe the winter the more appreciated is spring; the more evident the beauty of new life. tion of the Paschal Mystery. Equally important are our own life experiences to help us enter into this most profound season.

Gardeners and farmers all experience the wonder of the seed dying in order to produce life, in much more abundance. Others have experienced sickness and what recovery to health means. Such people experience in a special way the gift and preciousness of health and life.

Mothers, who have the unique

experience of giving birth, die in many ways to their own needs and desires in order to nurture new life.

But all this fades with the joy their child brings to their family.

Work is also a common way for people to experience the pains of dying and rising. Young and old all know hard work in any area or field generally produces good results.

Universally, all know what the ups and downs of life mean. We can all recount many examples.

The point I want to highlight is that all our experiences can bring a little insight into, and appreciation of, Jesus and his dying and rising – his passing from death to life. They help us enter more into the wonderful Paschal Mystery.

I would like to stress more importantly though that Jesus doesn’t just add meaning to the seasons and the experiences of those who go through various ups and downs of life. Our crucified and risen Lord is in all these happenings, events and experiences. He is there accompanying and sustaining us each moment. He is there drawing us from the cross to the resurrection, from death to life.

Jesus is not absent one moment.

Rather, through his incarnation and saving death and resurrection, Jesus is intimately one with us in all this.

He is there with open arms inviting us to unite ourselves and our sorrows, great and small, with his.

His transforming grace will lead us eventually from human death to the glory of the resurrection.

May our lives be filled this Easter with the hope, courage and peace that Jesus offers us because of the Paschal Mystery.

EASTER BLESSINGS

THE SACRAMENT FOR NEW LIFE

I

T DOESN’T seem so long ago that I was at St Mary’s College in Broome on Ash Wednesday morning, celebrating Mass and distributing the ashes. “Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return.”

Our task in the lead up to Easter is to restore our rightful relationship with God through prayerful penance and to restore our rightful relationship with humanity through an active love for others.

So now it is Easter. We glory in the goodness of God and marvel at his love for us. A love so boundless, a love so selfless, made abundantly evident in the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

The Church remembers at Easter God’s abundant love for his people.

The people of God rejoice in the remembering of God’s love for us all. We find in the mystery of Easter a source of great hope that death has been conquered by the promise of new life, life eternal.

No longer for the children of God is the grave merely a tomb for the dead but because of Easter it is a reminder to the faithful that we may one day be the saints we were called to be. Then we shall pass through death to union with God who has ‘called us out of darkness into his own wonderful light.’ While the Christian Church celebrates

Bishop Saunders the Easter feast, sadly, much of our world and a sizeable percentage of our society in Australia figure among the portion of non-believers.

It is hard to imagine Australia as a pagan country, yet increasingly it is developing all the hallmarks of a nation that is godless. Celebrities are the objects of new devotions in a witless culture of materialism and pleasure. Electronic media shapes opinions and interests in the pub-

Our churches are far too comfortable. They lack missionary zeal and justice is regarded as an optional extra. lic domain. It not only determines the fashions of the day but actually manufactures news as often as it reports it.

We have become slaves to technology. The so-called social media, including Facebook and Divas Chat, together with the ubiquitous texting, have replaced meaningful communication to some extent and driven us in every direction but together. Sometimes even churched people act as though they’re not thoroughly convinced of the gift

of salvation brought about by the suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus. The significance of this most holy of events eludes them. It needs to be said, our churches in this country are far too comfortable. They lack missionary zeal and justice is all too often regarded as an optional extra.

Regrettably, too few of us have taken the principle of the preferential option for the poor seriously. The sustaining life afforded by prayer and scripture are simply lacking in the way of our lives. How often do people give thanks to God for the food on their table? When do families pray together these days?

The ancient Jews knew the benefit of the Sabbath as a time for rest and quiet reflection. Now our day of rest looks very much like any other. Our generation has returned the money tables to the temple of our lives and forgotten that our baptism has called us, not merely to a professed creed but also to active service of the Gospel throughout our personal lives, within the life of our families and in the midst of the society to which we belong.

With the power of God’s grace, we must resist the temptation to privatise our religious beliefs and relegate them to the realm of Sunday practice and pious thoughts. If Christ’s passion, death and resurrection is for us the means of our redemption, then surely the way we live and behave is important.

Through the Easter Sacrament we have been saved and in that merciful act we are called to live positively, courageously, justly. And always with hope in our hearts.

STATIONS OF THE CROSS

Page 14

April 4, 2012, The Record

I

XII

Jesus is standing before

Finally, after the long

angry people yelling and

walk, falling three times

saying mean, hurtful things

and having men beat him,

to him. Some of them tell

after being nailed to the

lies, saying he did bad

cross and suffering on the

things. But Jesus stays quiet

cross, Jesus bows his head

even though he knows he

and dies. Now this part

will be hurt. He knows God

of his life is over. There

is with him. He even asks

is nothing left for Jesus

God to help him forgive

to give or to do. Jesus has

those who are screaming

given his life for all of us.

and telling lies.

II

sees how much he is suffering and Jesus sees the sadness she feels. Even though

When soldiers put a big,

they both know God is

heavy cross on his shoul-

with them, they can’t even

ders, Jesus doesn’t fight or

speak to each other as they

say angry words to them.

are so sad.

He knows he has to carry it will be very hard for him at times. But Jesus knows

Jesus is so tired the soldiers

God is with him and asks

know he cannot carry the

God to help carry the cross.

cross alone so they look

III

around and see someone who looks strong enough to help. This person’s name

Jesus is so tired as he walks

is Simon. Jesus just looks at

along the road with the

Simon and quietly whispers

heavy cross which keeps

“Thank you”. Then they

pushing into his shoul-

continue on the long road,

ders. The stones on the

carrying the cross together.

road hurt his feet. People

VI

yell and push him and the soldiers shout for him to move faster. Then Jesus

Jesus is hot, tired and

falls and they yell at him

sweating. His hair is all

more. How tired he is!

tangled and he is covered

He prays, “God, help me

in dust from the long walk.

remember you are here.”

Suddenly, a woman pushes

IV

her way out of the crowd and stands in front of him.

She takes a clean cloth and

As Jesus walks slowly with

gently wipes his face. Jesus

the cross, a woman comes

is so thankful he leaves a

up to him. It’s his mother,

picture of his face on her

Mary. How sad for them to

cloth.

see each other now. Mary feels so sad because she

How very tired, weak and

from the crowd and soldiers makes him feel even worse. Then Jesus falls.

VIII

After Jesus gets up, he continues on the road carrying his heavy cross. He passes some crying women who are sad to see him suffer.

Instead of thinking only of himself, Jesus tells the women not to keep crying because of him. He tells them, instead, to take care of others and especially of their children.

IX

Jesus is so tired now he can hardly take another step. It is hard for him to breathe. He has been walking a long time and has no energy left. He just can’t go on anymore. Then he falls down for the third time.

Jesus asks God to help

Now Jesus’ lifeless body is

to do.

X

though he keeps trying to walk with the heavy cross,

XIII

though it is hard for him

sad Jesus is now. Even

he can’t keep going. Noise

V

this cross a long way, and

VII

him. He gets up again even

taken down from the cross.

No more pain or suffering; all the pain is over. His

Finally, Jesus reaches the

mother holds him tenderly.

hill at the end of the road

How sad she is and how

he has to walk. Jesus knows

sad his friends are who cry

he will die here but, before

as they hold his body.

he dies, soldiers will do more to him. They pull off his long robe and almost

XIV

all his clothes. Jesus stands

Jesus’ friends wash his

in front of the crowd with

body, wrap him gently in

only a small piece of cloth

a clean sheet and put him

covering part of his body.

into a tomb. Then they

He asks God to help him

push a very large stone

remember he is not alone,

over the entrance so no one

God is with him through

can go inside. Now there is

all this.

darkness in the tomb where

XI

Jesus’ body lies and all his friends go home because they are very sad and tired.

How much Jesus hurts as

XV

soldiers nail him to the cross. He hurts all over, is tired and thirsty and knows

What a wonderful surprise

he is going to die. But he

for his friends when they

looks at the people who

see he is alive. His body is

have hurt him and instead

like a new kind of body -

of saying bad things to

full of light! He is no longer

them, Jesus asks God to

tired, sad or suffering. He

forgive them. He looks at

has no more pain. Yes,

his mother and tells her to

Jesus is alive in a new and

take care of others. Even

special way and will live

when he is dying, Jesus is

forever.

thinking of other people.

FUN FAITH

April 4, 2012, The Record

WITH

HOLY WEEK

CROSSWORD Across 1. Instead of praying, the disciples did this when Jesus went off to pray by himself.

2. The word people shouted to Jesus that means blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

3. Jesus was meant to die on this.

4. Taking this during the last supper symbolised Jesus’ body.

Down 1. The main reason that God gave his only son, Jesus to die for each of us.

2. On Sunday, the two Marys didn’t find Jesus but a tomb that was ____.

3. The angel told the women, “Don’t be afraid, Jesus isn’t here, he has ____!!

4. Jesus was forced to wear a crown made of these instead of a crown meant for a real king.

WORD LIST BREAD STONE LOVE EMPTY SLEPT

SACRIFICE HOSANNA RISEN CROSS THORNS

5. Jesus became the ____ for us, so we could be forgiven for our sins.

6. This was put in front of the tomb so nobody could steal Jesus’ body.

Easter Eggs The egg is a symbol of resurrection: with new life being contained within it. Traditionally, Easter eggs are dyed red to represent the blood of Christ, shed on the Cross, and the hard shell of the egg symbolised the sealed Tomb of Christ — the cracking of which symbolised his resurrection from the dead.

WIN!!

SEND YOUR COLOURED IN PICTURE TO THE RECORD AT PO BOX 3075, ADELAIDE TERRACE, PERTH WA 6832 TO BE IN THE RUNNNG TO WIN THIS WEEK’S PRIZE.

COLOUR IN COMPETITION

Page 15

April 4, 2012, The Record

THE RECORD

The above editorial appeared in the April 2 issue of the Western Catholic Reporter, newspaper of the Archdiocese of Edmonton, Alberta.

It was written by Glen Argan, editor and general manager.

ab

d the t

Zoom ahead a few hundred years to another meal, this one called the Last Supper.

There, Jesus declares his Father has given him the power to give eternal life to all who the Father has given him.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

l e Aro

I

t was at a dinner party, recounted in Plato’s dialogue Symposium, that Socrates confronted the notion put forward by several people that love is a matter of like attracting like. That notion is most explicit in a speech by the dramatist Aristophanes, who maintained that human beings were originally spherical beings who were cut in half by Zeus. Henceforth, each half longed to be reunited with its other half and “to heal the wound of human nature.”

Should two of those human halves ever encounter each other, they are “struck from their senses by love, by a sense of belonging to one another and by desire and they don’t want to be separated from one another, not even for a moment.”

This narcissistic view of love remains with us today under many guises. Socrates, however, sided with Diotima at the Symposium. Diotima rejected the notion that love is seeking one’s lost half. She maintained that what everyone really loves is the good.

Each person loves the good and wants the good to be theirs forever. Love stretches beyond the self and yearns for an immortal love.

Zoom ahead a few hundred years to another meal, this one called the Last Supper. At that dinner, there is but one speech about love, the one we know as Jesus’ high priestly prayer (John 17.1-26). There, Jesus declares that the Father has given him power “to give eternal life to all whom thou hast given him. And this is eternal life, that they know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent” (17.3-4).

In the second volume of his book Jesus of Nazareth, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger notes that what Jesus means by “eternal life” is not simply life after death. Rather, it refers to “life itself, real life, which can also be lived in the present age and is no longer challenged by physical death.”

Eternal life is gained through recognition – not PO Box 3075 of one’s missing other half – Adelaide Terrace but rather of the One who is PERTH WA 6832 totally other. Love aims not at restoring me to my full self, office@therecord.com.au but rather communion with Tel: (08) 9220 5900 the other. Love is self-tranFax: (08) 9325 4580 scendence and communion, above all, with God. Eternal life is not an escape from this world, but rather a delving into each moment in all its fullness. It challenges what Pope John Paul II used to call the split between faith and life, one of the great problems of our era.

The Eucharist is the centre of life, but that centre extends well beyond the walls of the church. Indeed, eternal life means the collapse of those walls and that the act of faith permeates every breath we take.

It means the constant, never-ending recognition of the Other. It means a love that stretches beyond the egoism of the self.

At the paschal triduum, we celebrate God’s gift of eternal life. Every day, we live out the self-transcendence to which that gift calls us.

IT IS welcome news that Bishops are speaking out against this dangerous legislation. Their courageous stand calls for our wholehearted support. Greg Donnelly, MLC for New South Wales, speaks truly in stating that the same-sex marriage push would radically alter national life for the worse (The Record, March 28). However he omits to mention another gravely important reason why we must act now.

A need to defend authentic marriage between one man and one woman is not only about defending the rights of every child against the breaking of the sacred, as well as biological, bond between parent and and child, but also about defending our inalienable rights of freedom of speech, freedom of conscience and freedom of religion.

These rights are under unremitting attack internationally.

In countries where same-sex marriage has been legalised, secular, as well as religious, marriage celebrants, caterers, photographers, and all concerned with wedding ceremonies, have been compelled to participate in same-sex “weddings” in violation of conscience.

An “exemption” for religious celebrants would be meaningless.

d the t n u

ab

Enter into Easter, and discover God’s love

More at stake in marriage debate

un

editorial

l e Aro

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Letters to the editor Freedom of conscience is an inalienable right for all, not a concession bestowed by government. Any who express disagreement have been charged with so-called “hate speech” legislation, a penalty for which is imprisonment.

Worst of all, children, from kindergarten up, are indoctrinated with compulsory propaganda in violation of parental rights. Is this what we want in Australia?

Some Christians have been deceived into thinking that civil unions would be a satisfactory compromise. Not so. In countries where that legislation is in place, such as the UK, the above consequences are equally disastrous,

resulting in factual persecution of Christians. Among other grave injustices, adoption agencies, which could not in conscience place a child with a same-sex couple, have been forced to close.

Civil unions, a same-sex register, or any other substitute, merely constitute a step to same-sex ‘marriage’.

Richard Waghorne, a homosexual who opposes the legislation, has written: “I have watched with growing irritation as principled opponents of gay marriage have put up with a stream of abuse for explaining their position”.

At the present time same-sex couples are not treated unjustly.

They have access to the same rights, legally and economically, as heterosexual couples. They are also free to celebrate their commitment on a social level. There is no need for any legislation. Once the line is crossed by imposing governmental recognition, our rights and freedoms are forfeit.

It is fallacious to claim that religion imposes its values on others.

In the light of factual evidence, the reverse is seen to be true. What is needed is reciprocity, and mutual respect for deeply held moral beliefs, which are, and will always be, irreconcilable.

Anne M Kirkwood ATTADALE, WA

Catholic family’s life opened door for me to enter Church Nuong Nguyen recalls the difference people she met made in her journey.

I

WAS a Buddhist by default.

In Vietnam when you are not baptised you are automatically considered a Buddhist.

I grew up in an environment where there was superstition and I was not happy with it. I looked for meaning in philosophy. I read the works of all the French philosophers but I was not happy with their answers. Those answers were not what I was looking for.

Then I met a boy who was Catholic when I was 21. I was attracted to his purity. I thought that he was not like the average person. We became friends and he told me about his family. They were just as beautiful as he was. His father loved his mother and treated her like a queen. Their children were so lovely. They seemed like the perfect family to me.

In my family my mother was very sad because my father was a womaniser. I told myself, “No, I am not going to be like my mother.” I found out Catholics were not allowed to have more than one wife. That was a good starting point! I asked my friend a lot of questions about being Catholic but he couldn’t answer all of them. He referred me to a priest.

I told the priest, “I want to know about the Catholic faith but I am not baptised.” He didn’t try to convert me. We met once a week and I asked him questions about being Catholic. This went on for a year.

Finally I was satisfied and wanted to be baptised because I loved what I had come to know. My friend’s family was the instrument of my conversion.

When I got baptised I was different from everyone else I knew.

My family, neighborhood and society were not Catholic. I would say to my family, “I can’t have dinner now. I will have it when I come back from Mass.” At first they were upset.

But then my father said something that made me happy. He said, “She is a better person as a Catholic.” He decided the Catholic faith was not that bad!

The Communists were very against religion. At that time a lot

Why I became Catholic

as told to Debbie Warrier

of seminaries were closed by the government. The rich became poor.

If you had a small business they classified you as a capitalist. They would confiscate your property and it became nationalised. People would have to sell their jewelry and furniture to buy food. The army could force you out of your homes at gun point. They controlled us by our stomach and fear.

When I went to Mass my mother would say, “Please don’t go because our family will be in trouble.” I told her I would tell the army that only

I met a boy and we became friends. He told me about his family.

His father treated his mother like a queen. In my family my mother was very sad.

I was Catholic and whatever they wanted to do to me, let them do it. They didn’t harm me because I was not a religious, in business or part of the old regime. I was just a student. The government did try to brainwash us but I decided to escape first. The only way was by boat.

Somebody organised the boat.

My mother provided the financial assistance for her son and three daughters to escape. We even had to buy the fuel. My parents stayed behind in Vietnam. It was not easy because the waterway was totally controlled 24 hours a day. You had to pretend things like you were transporting bananas for the gov-

ernment. The boat was not seaworthy. We didn’t know it because we were so inexperienced with sailing.

We set out to sea and hit a sandbank. My brother ran into the jungle. My neighbor was with us and she had a one month old baby. She said “Don’t leave me.” She could not run so eventually we got caught.

There were 40 to 50 people in that boat and we got taken to jail.

People were handcuffed and put into individual cells made of mud.

There was no electricity. When it came to our turn they had ran out of handcuffs and cells. We were put into a large hall.

I got malaria and was very sick.

They fed us pig food. I did nothing but pray day and night. In particular I prayed the rosary. God and a devotion to Our Lady was my anchor. I entrusted to them my whole being. Suddenly it dawned on me that I was going to escape. I told my sisters to come 10 minutes after me because if I got shot they would know not to follow.

In the morning they let us go to the river to wash our face and go to the toilet. Although it was tropical somehow that day there was a fog and we could not be seen. I ran into the paddy fields. I do not know how long I was running for. I caught a passing bus and saw my two sisters on the bus. They had made it safely.

Prisoners are not allowed to wear shoes but although people could see that we were barefoot no one spoke out. It was a miracle.

Some time after we decided to escape from Vietnam again. If you paid the Communists they would turn a blind eye and let you go.

We did this and I got to Australia when I was 24 years old. I went to University and studied accountancy. Then I got married, worked for a while and had three children.

One of the things that makes me sad is when we are so free [to practise our religion] we don’t value it.

When you are persecuted for your faith you find that it is so precious you can risk your property and even your life for it. Nothing else matters but faith.

April 4, 2012, The Record

Page 17

Putting ‘i’ in family, through the grace of God God’s grace overrides sheer willpower, says Mariette Ulrich, which is never enough.

I

F YOU think this column is about the erstwhile American TV sitcom, Will and Grace, sorry to disappoint; I’m just borrowing the title. This column is about my daily life, so it might have been titled “Joy and Fulfilment,” or to reflect the reality of certain days, “Stress and More Stress.”

It seems I’m getting busier all the time. I realise I signed up for that when I decided to marry and be open to raising a family. God has blessed us with seven living children, and we’ve homeschooled them from day one. Like most youngsters, our girls are involved in various extracurricular activities.

I do a fair bit of driving, sitting and waiting (three cheers for books, laptops, and iPods).

Although marriage, motherhood and homeschooling are my top priorities, serving in the wider community is also on the schedule. Over the years I’ve worked

@ home

with Mariette Ulrich

part-time tutoring online writing classes, served as a parish volunteer (lector, catechist, parish council) and volunteered with our local pro-life group and music festival committee.

I also find time for writing nonfiction (you’re reading it) and doing the occasional speaking engagement. Then there are my hobbies, required for health and sanity: reading (everything) and watching (mostly) costume dramas, writing fiction, blogging, and fitness—does it still count if I spend more time wishful thinking than actually exercising?

“Gosh, how do you do it all?” If I had a dollar for every time I’ve been

asked that question, I could probably afford a kitchen renovation.

The short answer is, I don’t do it all (rock-climbing, scrapbooking, and daily house-cleaning are not on the list) and I don’t do it all—every family member pitches in. I once met a lady who cynically called this child labour; I call it part of family life’s curriculum vitae: Home Economics

The only key to ‘success’, or basic survival ... is the free, ever-abundant, and thoroughly undeserved gift of God’s grace. and Other Survival Skills. After all, we’re not talking about toddlers shovelling out the fireplace cinders

at dawn, but school-age children setting the table, and teenagers learning to cook and do laundry.

I am blessed in my family life.

Some days I feel as though I’m on top of the world (usually after the third cup of coffee). When the odd person gushes that you must be a Supermom, it’s tempting to believe them but it’s not true. Nor does the feeling last. Sometimes I feel as though I’m burning out. When that happens, it’s usually because I’ve either taken on too much, or fallen into the trap of thinking that success, or even merely coping, has something to do with my own strength.

I’m often tempted to think: I can do all things if I just get organised; I can do all things if I buy a fancier day-planner or newer mobile phone. I can do all things if I get up earlier in the morning. I can do all things if I stop eating trans-fats.

I can do all things if I just exert my will. In my more lucid moments, I

come a little closer to the mark (but only a little) when I think: ‘I can do all things if I would just pray more.’

You can see which word appears most frequently in that litany: “I”.

When the focus is on me and my abilities, or what I can and need to do, I eventually (and predictably) fall flat on my face. Sheer willpower can only do so much, and some days, it’s not much at all. The only key to ‘success’, or basic survival, which is the best we can hope for on some days, is the free, ever-abundant, and thoroughly undeserved gift of God’s grace.

Even with the strongest willpower, it is grace that gets me up in the morning, grace that sends me on my way, and grace that sustains me every moment of my (sometimes long and busy) days. I can do all things in Christ who strengthens me (Philippians 4:13).

Grace can do nothing without the will and the will can do nothing without grace-St John Chrysostom.

The altar of instant communication Have we sacrificed once traditional courtesies at this altar, asks Fr David Watt, and if so, is Satan involved?

H

AVE you ever been with someone and had your conversation interrupted by a phone call? If a third person is present, courtesy dictates he wait for a break in the conversation before saying his piece, but someone who isn’t even there can just barge ahead. Or have you ever been talking on the phone and been left high and dry while your interlocutor attends to ‘call-waiting’?

Another example of how moderns will sacrifice traditional courtesies at the altar of instant communication – of whatever quality.

Despite the drawbacks of the phone, I can generally be reached that way. Furthermore, I have an answering machine but my critics still murmur. For yes, it is true, there are times I can’t be reached by phone. Here, we find one of the numerous paradoxes in modern thought. If a priest becomes incommunicado for a month because he is on holidays, no one objects.

Well, in over four years as a priest, I have never been absent for more than a few days at a time to help at a retreat. Yet, if I sometimes block out incoming calls, usually for less than a day, so as not to fall behind with work (eg answering of phone messages) I am ‘unavailable’ even though, unlike many priests, I have no clerical or lay help with the phone.

We are the children of an instantcoffee age. We want what we want, and by yesterday at the latest. If someone cannot be contacted right now, he cannot be contacted at all.

Why don’t I have an email?

Because I cling to the absurdly antiquated notion I should provide some feedback on correspondence I receive. This will not always be necessary eg if what arrives is itself an answer and raises no further issues. Often, however, courtesy will demand some response or acknowledgement. Difficult, if, like a priest-friend of mine, you receive 160 emails in one week.

Yes, I freely admit it – my ego is so bloated I actually think I’m worth a stamp. But, in selfdefence, I should add I think others are worth this too. Here, we find another of those contradictions in contemporary thinking. Moderns complain about the time, trouble and expense involved in putting a stamp on an envelope. One might therefore expect that when they

are the object of this heroic sacrifice they would be correspondingly appreciative. Such, however, does not appear to be so. Many or even most letters I send never score any response or acknowledgement unless I subsequently enquire and sometimes not even then. We have reached such a pass that no one now sees this as rude. What a contrast with the level of courtesy

currency. Amid the contemporary cacophony, an individual voice is, on average, worth less. Hence we must work harder to achieve the same result or less. That is why I must perform a song and dance in order to have my letters answered.

If, on a particular day, I receive both letters and phone messages, then, ceteris paribus, I will deal with letters first because the correspond-

Challoner Bible, for instance. But let us take a more basic criterion – typographical errors. Are there fewer now than, say, in the 19th century? Certainly, my own reading does not bear this out. A priori, you might think moderns would trounce all comers, equipped as we are with automatically-correcting word processors, spell check programs etc. But counteracting and

Could Satan be using modern means of communication to provide us with ‘busy work’, thus retrenching ‘time out’ to reflect, and, above all, to pray? formerly obtained, even between total strangers. If a businessman eg foresaw a delay in answering a letter he would send out an immediate acknowledgement so as to assure the correspondent his letter had arrived and was under consideration.

The mu lt ipl i c at i on of communication-media seems to have been attended with a proportionate devaluing of the

ents have been to more trouble, and earlier too since posting must have occurred by yesterday at the latest.

I think, however, the average modern would deal with phone messages first.

The craze for ‘instant’ media – phones, faxes, email etc – has vastly increased the volume of communication but has it also improved its quality? It seems to me our English is much inferior to that of the

perhaps overbalancing this factor is today’s phrenesy which stops people from sitting down to get it right. And a large contributing factor to this phrenesy is de facto the proliferation of ‘instant’ communications media. Of course, the pace of communication was stepped up well before the invention of these media. Take the whole news industry: by a certain time there must be produced a paper of a certain thick-

ness, whether or not there is that amount of noteworthy material to print. All the more credit, then, to the journalist who succeeds in transcending this in-built limitation by writing a piece which is both genuinely newsworthy and error-free.

Have the press and later media served more to unite than to divide?

Nowadays, people are sometimes reluctant to give not only an address but even a phone number. Or take a different example: the sign ‘No Junk Mail.’ Although I disapprove of this phrase on account of its rudeness, I can understand the reaction. Faced with an endless barrage of words, people feel the need to protect their privacy.

Even in today’s world, however, vestiges of traditional courtesies remain. For example, wedding invitations still arrive by the ‘snail mail’ and give notification many weeks in advance. Often, however, the modern penchant for instant communication seems to result in mental laziness and lack of planning.

Events are arranged in slipshod fashion at the last minute, all of which adds to pressure on people.

Have you noticed how ‘stressedout’ everyone is nowadays? Surely the mania for instant communication must bear part of the blame.

Likewise, the fact that despite our washing-machines and other timesaving devices, no one seems to have any time.

Sadly, modern ideas on communication have infected the Church to a considerable degree. The good priest is one who, armed with a mobile phone, charges from one meeting to the next. Whereas it has been well said that when a priest has finished his Mass and Office, he has completed 80 per cent of his work for the day. And, I would add, if he has prayed his rosary and fasted when appropriate, he has completed 95 per cent.

Could Satan be using modern means of communication to provide us with ‘busy work’, thus retrenching ‘time out’ to reflect, take stock of ourselves and, above all, to pray? Solus cum Solo.

I am confident that with the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart I will not see what I see now, viz, people walking past Catholic churches while talking on their mobile phones. If they still have their phones they will be switched off and a visit will be paid to the Blessed Sacrament.

Page 18

April 4, 2012, The Record

PANORAMA FRIDAY, APRIL 6 - SATURDAY, APRIL 14 Divine Mercy Novena 2.30pm at Holy Family Parish, Lot 375 Alcock St, Maddington. Confession 3–4pm Divine Mercy Chaplet and novena, preaching on Divine Mercy, prayers for healing. Enq: 9493 1703.

NEXT WEEK SUNDAY, APRIL 15 Divine Mercy 1.30pm at St Mary’s Cathedral. The feast will be celebrated with reconciliation, holy rosary and Chaplet of Divine Mercy followed by holy Mass at 2.30pm. The main celebrant and homilist of the afternoon will be Bishop Don Sproxton and other priests are invited to concelebrate. Benediction will be offered afterwards by Fr Tiziano Bogoni and conclude with veneration of two first class relics of St Faustina Kowalska. Followed by refreshments and tea. Enq: John 9457 7771.

4th Annual Celebration of the Feast of Divine Mercy 2–3pm at Holy Family Parish, Lot 375, Alcock St, Maddington. Confession 3–5pm, procession, Eucharistic Adoration, 5pm solemn feast day Mass.

Enq: 9493 1703.

Devotion to Divine Mercy 2.30pm at All Saints Parish, Greenwood. There will be exposition of the Blessed Sacrament followed

by Divine Mercy novena at 3pm and Mass. Enq: Charles 0416 22 6943.

Divine Mercy 3pm at St Bernadette Parish, Glendalough, 49 Jugan St, Mount Hawthorn. Divine Mercy Chaplet, sung litany of Divine Mercy. 3.30pm celebrated Mass with veneration of Divine Mercy image.

Mass celebrant Fr Ronan Murphy. 4.30pm rite of benediction and veneration of sacred relic of St Faustina. (Please go to confession prior to feast day.) Enq: 9444 6131.

FRIDAY, APRIL 20 4th Anniversary Celebration Mass 2pm at St Jerome’s Parish, 36 Troode St, Munster.

St Jerome’s Divine Mercy group invites all Divine Mercy prayer groups and everyone to celebrate our 4th anniversary with a healing Mass. Service will be led by Fr Varghese Parackal VC. From 2-3pm: exposition of the Blessed Sacrament and Divine Mercy Chaplet. 3-4pm Mass, talk on divine mercy and healing. Enq: Connie 9494 1495.

Healing Service Talk 7pm at St Bernadette’s Catholic Parish, 49 Jugan St, Glendalough. Followed by Alan Ames’ healing service talk.

SATURDAY, 21 AND SUNDAY, APRIL 22 Catholic Faith Renewal Retreat 9am-6pm at James Nestor Hall, 50 Ruislip St, West Leederville. Fr Gino Henriques will lead a retreat on “God’s life giving covenant of love in marriage and family life”. Enq: Kathy 9295 0913 or Ann 0412 166 164 or catholicfaithrenewal@gmail.com.

UPCOMING SUNDAY, APRIL 22 Latin Mass 2pm at Good Shepherd Parish, Streich Ave, Kelmscott. Enq: John 9390 6646.

SUNDAY, APRIL 29 75th Anniversary 10am Mass at St Francis Xavier Church, Quairading followed by lunch. Celebrating the anniversary of the blessing and opening of the parish. Enq: Boyle (08) 9645 1513 or Box 163, Quairading 6383.

Reflection Day 10am at Secular Franciscan Order Redemptorist Monastery, 190 Vincent St, North Perth, (enter though main door). Morning tea followed by morning prayer 10.30am. Mass at 2.30pm. Please bring a plate for shared lunch. Enq: Angela 9275 5658.

SATURDAY, 5 MAY Day with Mary 9am-5pm at St Jerome Parish, 36 Troode St, Munster. Day of prayer and instruction based on the Fatima message. 9am video; 10.10am holy Mass; Reconciliation, procession of the Blessed Sacrament, Eucharistic Adoration, sermons on Eucharist and on Our Lady, rosaries and Stations of the Cross. BYO lunch. Enq: Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate 9250 8286.

SUNDAY, MAY 6 2012 Busselton May Rosary Pilgrimage in Honour of Our Lady 12.30pm at Queen of the Holy Rosary Shrine, Bove’s Farm, Roy Rd, Jindong, Busselton. Begins with hymn singing and concelebrated Mass led

by Fr Tony at 1pm. Followed by rosary procession, benediction and afternoon tea. Note: Roy Rd runs off Bussell Hwy, approx halfway between Busselton and Margaret River. Enq and bus bookings: Francis 0404 893 877 or 9459 3873.

What’s on around the Archdiocese of Perth, where and when

Parish Mission 6pm at St Joseph’s Parish, 20 Hamilton St, Bassendean, will be presenting a parish mission entitled To Serve is to Reign by Fr Joseph Aytona, Fathers of Mercy. Five consecutive nights, confession followed by presentation and benediction prayer service. Except the last night on Thursday, 5.30pm confession, 6pm holy Mass followed by closing dinner. Bring a plate and RVSP is needed for dinner. Topics include The Holy Eucharist, God’s Infinite Mercy, The Church: Mother and Teacher, The Universal Call to Holiness and Our Lady, the Blessed Virgin Mary. Enq: 9379 2691 or stjosephs.bassendean@perthcatholic.org.au.

Divine Mercy 1.30pm at St Francis Xavier Parish, 25 Windsor St, East Perth. Celebrating 20 years of Divine Mercy devotions in the Archdiocese of Perth with thanksgiving. Mass will be celebrated by Fr Marcellinus Meilak OFM and Fr Johnson Malayil CRS. The afternoon concludes with veneration of first class relic of St Faustina Kowalska. Followed by refreshments. Enq: John 9457 7771.

SATURDAY, 12 MAY Divine Mercy 2.30pm at St Francis Xavier Parish, 25 Windsor St, East Perth. Main celebrant will be Fr Marcellinus Meilak OFM. Reconciliation in English and Italian will be offered. Followed by Divine Mercy prayer, followed by veneration of first class relic of St Faustina Kowalska. Followed by refreshments.

Enq: John 9457 7771.

SUNDAY, MAY 27 Taizé Prayer Evening 7-8pm at St Lawrence Parish, Balcatta. Spend an hour listening to simple music (canons), short readings from the Scriptures and intercession prayer. Reflect on the mercy of God in silence. Enq: Fr Irek Czech SDS or parish office Tues - Thur, 9am2.30pm 9344 7066.

REGULAR EVENTS EVERY SUNDAY Gate of Heaven Catholic Radio Join the Franciscans of the Immaculate from 7.309pm on Radio Fremantle 107.9FM for Catholic radio broadcast of EWTN and our own live shows. Enq: radio@ausmaria.com.

Pilgrim Mass - Shrine of the Virgin of the Revelation 2pm at Shrine, 36 Chittering Rd, Bullsbrook.

Commencing with rosary followed by benediction.

Reconciliation is available before every celebration.

Anointing of the sick administered during Mass every second Sunday of the month. Pilgrimage in honour of the Virgin of the Revelation last Sunday of the month. Side entrance to church and shrine open daily between 9am-5pm. Enq Sacri 9447 3292.

EVERY FIRST SUNDAY St Mary’s Cathedral Youth Group – Fellowship with Pizza 5pm at St Mary’s Cathedral, 17 Victoria Sq, Perth.

Begins with youth Mass followed by fellowship downstairs in parish centre. Bring a plate to share.

Enq: Bradley on youthfromsmc@gmail.com.

EVERY SECOND SUNDAY Healing Hour 7-8pm at St Lawrence Parish, Balcatta. Join us for songs of praise and worship, exposition of the Blessed Sacrament and prayers for the sick (except Easter Sunday). Enq: Fr Irek Czech SDS or parish office Tues - Thur, 9am-2.30pm 9344 7066.

EVERY THIRD SUNDAY Oblates of St Benedict – Meeting 2pm at St Joseph’s Convent, York St, South Perth.

For all interested in studying the Rule of St Benedict and its relevance to the everyday life of today for laypeople: Vespers and afternoon tea afterwards. Enq: Secretary 9457 5758.

EVERY FOURTH SUNDAY

St and College Rd. Eucharistic adoration, reconciliation, evening prayer and benediction, followed by Mass and night prayer at 8pm. Enq: Kim on 9384 0598 or email to claremont@perthcatholic.org.au.

The Life and Mission of St Mary MacKillop 9.30-11.30am at Infant Jesus Parish Centre, cnr Wellington Rd and Smith St, Morley. Cost: $15.

Enq: Shelley 9276 8500.

LAST MONDAY OF THE MONTH Be Still in His Presence – Ecumenical Christian Program 7.30-8.45pm at St Swithun Anglican Church, 195 Lesmurdie St, Lesmurdie (hall behind church).

Begins with songs of praise and worship, silent time, lectio divina, small group sharing and a cuppa at the end. Enq: Lynne 9293 3848 or 043 5252 941.

EVERY TUESDAY Bible Teaching with a Difference 7.30pm at St Joachim’s parish hall, Victoria Park.

Exciting revelations with meaningful applications that will change your life. Bring Bible, a notebook and a friend. Enq: Jan 9284 1662.

Novena to Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal 6pm at Pater Noster Church, Marmion and Evershed Sts, Myaree. Mass at 5.30pm followed by benediction. Enq: John 040 8952 194.

EVERY FIRST TUESDAY Short MMP Cenacle for Priests 2pm at Edel Quinn Centre, 36 Windsor St, East Perth. Enq: Fr Watt 9376 1734.

EVERY WEDNESDAY Holy Spirit of Freedom Community 7.30pm at The Church of Christ, 111 Stirling St, Perth. We are delighted to welcome everyone to attend our Holy Spirit of Freedom praise meeting.

Enq: 042 3907 869 or hsofperth@gmail.com.

Bible Study at Cathedral 6.15pm at St Mary’s Cathedral, 17 Victoria Sq, Perth.

Deepen your faith through reading and reflecting on holy Scripture by Fr Jean-Noel. Meeting room beneath Cathedral. Enq: Marie 9223 1372.

Holy Hour - Catholic Youth Ministry CYM is back in 2012, followed by $5 supper and fellowship. Mass at 5.30pm and Holy Hour (adoration) at 6.30pm at the Catholic Pastoral Centre, 40A Mary St, Highgate. Enq: www.cym.com or 9422 7912.

EVERY FIRST WEDNESDAY Holy Hour Prayer for Priests 7.30-8.30pm at Holy Spirit Parish, 2 Keaney Pl, City Beach. All welcome. Enq: Linda 9341 3079.

Novena to St Mary of the Cross MacKillop 7-7.45pm at Blessed Mary MacKillop Parish, cnr Cassowary Dr and Pelican Pde, Ballajura. Begins with Mass, novena prayers and benediction.

Followed by healing prayers and anointing of the sick. Enq: Madi 9249 9093 or Gerry 0417 187 240.

EVERY SECOND WEDNESDAY Chaplets of Divine Mercy 7.30pm at St Thomas More Parish, Dean Rd, Bateman. A beautiful, prayerful, sung devotion.

Includes exposition followed by benediction. Enq: George 9310 9493 or 9325 2010 (w).

EVERY THURSDAY Divine Mercy 11am at Ss John and Paul Church, Pinetree Gully Rd, Willetton. Pray the rosary and Chaplet of Divine Mercy and for the consecrated life, especially here in John Paul Parish. Concludes with veneration of the first class relic of St Faustina. Please do come and join us in prayer. Enq: John 9457 7771.

St Mary’s Cathedral Praise Meeting 7.45pm every Thursday at the Legion of Mary’s Edel Quinn Centre, 36 Windsor St, East Perth. Includes praise, song and healing ministry. Enq: Kay 9382 3668 or fmi@flameministries.org.

EVERY FIRST THURSDAY OF THE MONTH

Holy Hour for Vocations to the Priesthood, Religious Life 2-3pm at Infant Jesus Parish, Wellington St, Morley. The hour includes exposition of the blessed Eucharist, silent prayer, scripture and prayers of intercession. Come and pray that those discerning vocations can hear clearly God’s call.

Prayer in Style of Taizé 7.30-8.30pm at Our Lady of Grace Parish, 3 Kitchener St, North Beach. Includes prayer, song and silence in candlelight – symbol of Christ the light of the world. Taizé info: www.taize.fr. Enq: secretary 9448 4888 or 9448 4457.

Voice of the Voiceless Healing Mass 12pm at St Bridgid’s Parish, 211 Aberdeen St. Northbridge. Bring a plate to share after Mass.

Enq: Frank 9296 7591 or 0408 183 325.

Group Fifty – Charismatic Renewal Group 7.30pm at the Redemptorist Monastery, 150 Vincent St, North Perth. Includes prayer, praise and Mass. Enq: Elaine 9440 3661.

EVERY LAST SUNDAY OF THE MONTH

EVERY FIRST FRIDAY

Filipino Mass 3pm at Notre Dame Church, cnr Daley and Wright Sts, Cloverdale. Please bring a plate to share for socialisation after the Mass. Enq: Fr Nelson Po 0410 843 412, Elsa 0404 03 8483.

Healing Mass 7pm at St Peter’s Parish, Inglewood. Praise and worship, exposition and Eucharistic adoration, benediction and anointing of the sick followed by holy Mass and fellowship. Celebrants Fr Dat and invited priests. 6.45pm Reconciliation. Enq: Mary Ann 0409 672 304, Prescilla 043 3457 352 and Catherine 043 3923 083.

EVERY MONDAY Evening Adoration and Mass 7pm at St Thomas Parish, Claremont, cnr Melville

Holy Hour for Vocations to the Priesthood

and Religious Life 7pm at Little Sisters of the Poor Chapel, 2 Rawlins St, Glendalough. Mass followed by adoration with Fr Doug Harris. All welcome. Refreshments provided.

Healing and Anointing Mass 8.45am Pater Noster Church, Evershed St, Myaree.

Begins with reconciliation followed by 9am Mass of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, anointing of the sick and prayers to St Peregrine. Enq: Joy 9337 7189.

EVERY FIRST SATURDAY OF THE MONTH Healing Mass 12.35pm at St Thomas Parish, cnr Melville St and College Rd, Claremont. Spiritual leader Fr Waddell.

Enq: Kim 9384 0598, claremont@perthcatholic.org. au.

EVERY LAST SATURDAY Novena Devotions – Our Lady Vailankanni of Good Health 5pm at Holy Trinity Parish, 8 Burnett St, Embleton.

Followed by Mass at 6pm. Enq: George 9272 1379.

GENERAL Free Divine Mercy Image for Parishes High quality oil painting and glossy print – Divine Mercy Promotions. Images are of very high quality.

For any parish willing to accept and place inside the church. Oil paintings - 160 x 90cm and glossy print - 100 x 60cm. Enq: Irene 9417 3267 (w).

Sacred Heart Pioneers Is there anyone out there who would like to know more about the Sacred Heart pioneers? If so, please contact Spiritual Director Fr Doug Harris 9444 6131 or John 9457 7771.

St Philomena’s Chapel 3/24 Juna Drive, Malaga. Mass of the day: Monday 6.45am. Vigil Masses: Mon-Fri 4.45pm. Enq: Fr David 9376 1734.

Mary MacKillop Merchandise Available for sale from the Mary MacKillop Centre.

Enq: Sr Maree 041 4683 926 or 08 9334 0933.

Financially Disadvantaged People Requiring Low Care Aged Care Placement The Little Sisters of the Poor community - set in beautiful gardens in the suburb of Glendalough.

“Making the elderly happy, that is everything!” St Jeanne Jugan (foundress). Registration and enq: Sr Marie 9443 3155.

Resource Centre for Personal Development The Holistic Health Seminar “The Instinct to Heal’’, every Tuesday 3-4.30pm; and RCPD2 “Internalise Principles of Successful Relationships and Use Emotional Intelligence and Communication Skills” every Tuesday 4.30-6.30pm, 197 High St, Fremantle - Tuesdays 3-4.30pm. Enq: Eva 0409 405 585. Bookings are essential.

Courses held at The Faith Centre in 2012 450 Hay St, Perth 1. RCPD2 - Internalise Principles of Successful Relationships and Use Emotional Intelligence and Communication Skills This course provides knowledge of principles that, if applied, will improve all relationships. Skills of self-analysis are taught as well as communication skills. Mondays: 5-7pm, from until 10 Dec. For enquiries or bookings ph Paul 0402 222 578.

2. RCPD4 – Increase Personal and Spiritual Awareness and Improve Relationships This course promotes self-awareness and spiritual growth. Emotional development is explained in order to improve understanding between persons. Study of Psychology and Theology. Mondays: 10am–12.30pm, from until 10 Dec. For enquiries or bookings ph Eva 0409 405 585.

3. Higher Certificate in Biblical Studies The Higher Certificate of Biblical Studies is a distance education programme that can be followed in your own home at your own pace with periodic face-to-face contact workshops. Tutorial assistance is available as required. It is equivalent to a one-year tertiary course, although it is recommended that you aim to complete it in two years.

For enquiries and enrolment, ph The Faith Centre on 6140 2420.

Is your son or daughter unsure of what to do this year?

Suggest a Certificate IV course to discern God’s purpose for their life. They will also learn more about the Catholic faith and develop skills in communication and leadership. Acts 2 College of Mission & Evangelisation (National Code 51452).

Enq: Jane 9202 6859.

AA Alcoholics Anonymous Is alcohol costing you more than just money? Enq: AA 3253 5666.

Saints and Sacred Relics Apostolate Invite SSRA, Perth invites interested parties, parish priests, leaders of religious communities, lay associations, to organise relic visitations to their own parishes, communities, etc. We have available authenticated relics, mostly first-class, of Catholic saints and blesseds including Sts Mary Mackillop,

Padre Pio, Anthony of Padua, Therese of Lisieux, Maximilian Kolbe and Simon Stock and Blessed Pope John Paul II. Free of charge and all welcome. Enq: Giovanny 0478 201 092 or ssra-perth@ catholic.org.

Aboriginal Scholarships, Year 7, 2013 – Closing April 27, 2012 As a commitment to working with Aboriginal people to enhance life choices and help further career opportunities for Aboriginal youth, La Salle College offers Aboriginal Scholarships each year.

This scholarship entitles the recipients to full/ partial tuition. Applications close April 27, 2012.

An application form can be downloaded from the college website at www.lasalle.wa.edu.au by viewing Scholarships under Parent Resources.

Enrolments, Year 7, 2014 La Salle College is now accepting enrolments for Year 7, 2014. For a prospectus and enrolment form please contact college reception on 9274 6266 or email lasalle@lasalle.wa.edu.au.

Pellegrini Books Wanted An order of Sisters in Italy is looking for the following: The Living Pyx of Jesus, Fervourings From Galilee’s Hills, Fervourings From the LoveBroken Heart of Christ, Fervourings From the Lips of the Mast, Listening to the Indwelling Presence, Sheltering the Divine Outcast, Daily Inspection and Cleansing of the Living Temple of God, and Staunch Friends of Jesus, the Lover of Youth. If you are able to help, please contact Justine on 0419 964 624 or justine@waterempire.com.

Day with Mary As the first Saturday in April is Holy Saturday, there will be no Day With Mary. The next one will be on May 5 at St Jerome Parish in Munster.

Communion of Reparation All Night Vigils Good Friday As Friday, April 6 falls on Good Friday, the Friday/ Saturday vigils at St Gerard Majella Church, Mirrabooka and Corpus Christi Church, Mosman Park will not take place but will recommence on Friday, May 4 as usual.

Healing Mass There will not be a Healing Mass on Good Friday, April 6 at St Peter’s Parish, Wood St, Inglewood.

The next Healing Mass will be on Friday, May 4 and every first Friday following.

Secondhand Electric Organ Good working condition. Angela Vigolo would like to give it away to a good home; maybe a parish would like it? Enq: Angela 9276 9317.

ST PAUL LITURGICAL CALENDAR 2012

ONLY

$5

Popular pocket-size calendar, indicating readings and themes for Mass every day of the year.

Presented in two-colour format.

Panorama Deadline Friday 5pm

Classifieds

April 4, 2012, The Record

Page 19

CLASSIFIEDS Deadline: 11am Monday RELIGIOUS PRODUCTS

MISSION ACTIVITIES

PILGRIMAGES

CATHOLICS CORNER Retailer of Catholic products specialising in gifts, cards and apparel for Baptism, Communion and Confirmation. Ph 9456 1777.

Shop 12, 64-66 Bannister Rd, Canning Vale. Open Mon-Sat.

LEARN HOW TO MAKE ROSARY BEADS for the missions and special rosaries for family and friends. Phone: (02) 6822 1474 or visit our website: OurLadysRosaryMakers.org.au.

TO OUR LADY OF VELANKANNI, ST FRANCIS XAVIER, ST PHILOMENA, ST MOTHER THERESA OF KOLKATA

RICH HARVEST YOUR CHRISTIAN SHOP Looking for Bibles, CDs, books, cards, gifts, statues, Baptism/Communion apparel, religious vestments, etc? Visit us at 39 Hulme Ct (off McCoy St), Myaree. Ph 9329 9889 (after 10.30am Mon to Sat).

We are here to serve.

KINLAR VESTMENTS www.kinlarvestments.com.au Quality handmade and decorated vestments: albs, stoles, chasubles, altar linen, banners, etc. 12 Favenc Way, Padbury. By appointment only.

Ph Vickii on 9402 1318, 0409 114 093 or kinlar.vestments@ gmail.com.

TRADE SERVICES BRENDAN HANDYMAN SERVICES Home, building maintenance, repairs and renovations. NOR. Ph 0427 539 588.

PROPERTY MAINTENANCE Your handyperson. No job too small. SOR. Jim 0413 309 821.

BRICK RE-POINTING Ph Nigel 9242 2952.

PICASSO PAINTING Top service. Ph 0419 915 836, 9345 0557 or fax 9345 0505.

PERROTT PAINTING Pty Ltd For all your residential, commercial painting requirements. Ph Tom Perrott 9444 1200.

LAWNMOWING AND WEED SPRAYING Garden clean ups and rubbish removal. Get rid of bindii, jojo and other unsightly weeds. Based in Tuart Hill. Enq: 9443 9243 or 0402 326 637.

FURNITURE REMOVAL ALL AREAS. Competitive rates.

Mike Murphy Ph 0416 226 434.

BOOK BINDING NEW BOOK BINDING, general book repairs; rebinding; new ribbons; old leather bindings restored. Tydewi Bindery 0422 968 572.

SETTLEMENTS ARE YOU BUYING OR SELLING real estate or a business?

Why not ask Excel Settlements for a quote for your settlement.

We offer reasonable fees, excellent service and no hidden costs.

Ring Excel on 9481 4499 for a quote. Check our web site on www.excelsettlements.com.au.

TAX SERVICE QUALITY TAX RETURNS PREPARED by registered tax agent with over 35 years’ experience.

Call Tony Marchei on 0412 055 184 for appointment. AXXO Accounting & Management, Unit 20/222 Walter Rd, Morley.

ACCOMMODATION HOLIDAY ACCOMMODATION Esperance holiday accommodation, three bedroom house, fully furnished. Phone 08 9076 5083.

POSITION AVAILABLE ELECTRICIAN WANTED Robmar Electrical Service (EC007003). Apply to Rob Mazone 9306 5773 or 0417 957 329.

HEALTH ACHES, PAIN, STRESS Indian mature male masseur. Reflex Relax Massage $30 per hour. Jai 0438 520 993.

Tour covers all main cities in India: Chennai, Pondicherry, Velan-kanni, Bangalore, Mysore, Cochin, Goa, Delhi, Thaij Mahal, Kolkata, Darjeeling and more.

Contact Charles Donovan 0400 216 257 or F Sam 0426 506 510.

OPTION 1: 25 DAYS: PILGRIMAGE TO HOLY LAND, ROME, COLLAVALENZA, DUBLIN (IRELAND FOR EUCHARISTIC CONGRESS), KNOCK AND MEDJUGORJE Departing May 22, from $7,790, includes flight transfers, bed, breakfast, evening meals, guide, taxes. Spiritual Director Fr Ronan Murphy. Leader Yolanda Nardizzi. Tel: 9245 2222, Mob 0413 707 707.

OPTION 2: 19 DAYS: PILGRIMAGE TO ROME, COLLAVALENZA, DUBLIN (IRELAND FOR EUCHARISTIC CONGRESS), KNOCK AND MEDJUGORJE. Departing May 29, from $5,990, includes flight transfers, bed, breakfast, evening meals, guide, taxes. Spiritual Director Fr Ronan Murphy. Leader Yolanda Nardizzi. Tel: 9245 2222, Mob 0413 707 707.

PILGRIMAGE DEPART PERTH APRIL 30, RETURN MAY 17/18 (early hours) for Paris (3 nights) visit Lisieux (St Therese), Notre Dame for Relics of The Passion, Sacre Coeur, Miraculous Medal Shrine, St Vincent De Paul.

Flight to Lourdes 5 nights stay, flight to Split 7 nights stay in Medjugorje.

Spiritual Director Fr Bogoni.

Costs $5,395: includes flight transfers, bed, breakfast, evening meals, guide, tipping and taxes.

Contact: Eileen 9402 2480, mob 0407 471 256, or medjugorje@ y7mail.com.

C R O S S W O R D

ACROSS 7 He accompanied Joshua as he reconnoitred the land of Canaan 8 Title in the canonisation process 10 Priest 12 Title for Pio 13 “…the babe leaped in her ___” (Lk 1:41) 16 Third century pope 18 Diocese on the French Riviera 20 ___ culpa 21 The Flood 22 Series of nine 25 “… begin our account without further ___ …” (2 Macc 2:32) 26 The woman wiped Jesus’ feet with hers (Lk 7:38) 27 What the apostles did while Jesus prayed in the Garden 28 The Feast of Christ the ___ 29 Catholic newsman and “Hardball” host Matthews 31 Holy ___ 34 Sacramental sign of Confirmation 35 “I desire ___, not sacrifice” (Mt 9:13) DOWN 1 Catholic Oscar-winning actor of “Leaving Las Vegas” fame 2 Noon prayer time 3 Sin against hope 4 Prayer counter 5 Catholic actress Dunaway 6 Patron saint of boy scouts 9 “…___ from the Father and the

GREAT GIFTS FOR FAMILY AND FRIENDS FROM THE RECORD BOOKSHOP

See Page 20 for the newest and most exclusive books for 2012

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For $85 you can receive a year’s worth of The Record delivered to your house

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W O R D S L E U T H

Son” 11 John wore clothes made from this animal (Mt 3:4) 14 Alpha and ___ 15 Canadian priest in the Hockey Hall of Fame 17 Make holy 18 Catholic columnist and TV commentator, Robert ___ 19 ___ of the Mass 23 St ___ Stein 24 God is three, with one divine nature 26 Minor prophet of the 6th century 29 Brother of Abel 30 Ancestress of Jesus 32 “O Mary! we crown ___ with blossoms today” 33 “___ homo”

LAST WEEK’S SOLUTION

Catholicism Series

Page 20

Fr. Robert Barron created the groundbreaking CATHOLICISM ADULT STUDY PROGRAM as a thematic presentation of what Catholics believe and why, so all adults can come to a deeper understanding of the Catholic Faith.

Not a video lecture, Church history or scripture study, this engaging and interesting formational program uses the art, architecture, literature, music and all the treasures of the Catholic tradition to illuminate the timeless teachings of the Church.

CATHOLICISM LEADER’S KIT

CATHOLICISM STUDY GUIDE

CATHOLICISM 5 DVD SET

INCLUDING 5 DVD SET & STUDY GUIDE SET

50

$

362.95

$

+ Postage/ Handling

$

.95

217.95

+ Postage/ Handling

+ Postage/ Handling

ISBN: 978 0 98323 344 2

ISBN: 978 0 98323 345 9

ISBN: 793 5 7304 259 0

The CATHOLICISM Study Program Leader’s Kit includes:

This study guide and workbook takes each student of CATHOLICISM deeper into the Faith and into the DVD series (DVD set sold separately). It is appropriate for individual or group study.

From the sacred lands of Israel to the beating heart of Uganda... from the glorious shrines of Italy, France, and Spain, to the streets of Mexico, Kolkata, and New York City, the fullness of CATHOLICISM is revealed. Journey deep into the Faith as you watch each episode.

The ten compelling episodes from the series in a DVD box set.

The companion Leader’s Study Guide and Workbook.

A 300-page companion book with full-colour photos from the filming locations A set of 40 prayer cards for the New Evangelization, promotional materials and a bonus Faith Clips DVD, a valuable reference tool for any group leader.

The CATHOLICISM Study Guide and Workbook contains ten lessons, which correspond to each episode of Father Barron’s DVD series.

Shook me to the core...

Mike Leonard, NBC Today Show Correspondent and Executive Producer of CATHOLICISM

Answering the call for The New Evangelization, this multi-media educational program reveals the truth, beauty and richness of the Faith in an unprecedented way.

Features: 5 DVD Set, each contains 2 episodes, 50-60 min per episode.

The Record will advise you of Postage / Handling costs before processing your order.

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