Record
W E S T E R N A U S T R A L I A’ S A WA R D - W I N N I N G C AT H O L I C N E W S P A P E R S I N C E 1 8 7 4
the the
We d n e s d a y, M a y 8 , 2 0 1 3
Parish.
The Church’s digital frontier A new Australian eBook looks at the challenge of social media - Pages 9 -12
the
N at i o n .
the
World.
$2.00
therecord.com.au
Heavenly homeland The Chinese bishop who bridged the gap between State and Church - Page 13
In this Month of Mary, Perth parishes gather to pray to
Our Mother and our Queen
St Jerome’s Munster parishioner Montais Portinha takes a moment after placing a crown on a statue of Our Lady of Lourdes during 10am Mass at St Jerome’s Church last Sunday. During the Offertory, parish children carried flowers to the church’s sanctuary in prepation for the parish’s annual Crowning of Mary Queen of the May ceremony. See story - page 6. PHOTO: MATHEW DE SOUSA
Refusal to lift Newstart is a fundamental failure By Matthew Biddle and Carol Glatz BISHOP Christopher Saunders has called for the Federal Government to increase payments to job-seekers around the country. Bishop Saunders, the chairman of the Australian Catholic Social Justice Council, made the request in the ACSJC’s annual pastoral letter. In the letter he advocated raising the Newstart allowance to help those seeking employment to cover
the rising costs of living. “Adequately addressing the needs of vulnerable individuals and families is a particular requirement of good government,” Bishop Saunders said in the letter. “[Australia’s] social security system is now failing the fundamental test of getting food on the table. “Allowances have failed to keep pace with community living standards and have become less adequate over time.” The Bishops’ comments coincide with Pope Francis’ call for greater
efforts to create dignified work for more people. Pope Francis called for an end to slave labour and human trafficking as well as greater efforts to create dignified work for more people on May 1, feast of St Joseph the worker. The problem of unemployment is “very often caused by a purely economic view of society, which seeks self-centered profit, outside the bounds of social justice,” the Pope said. “I wish to extend an invitation to everyone to greater solidarity and
to encourage those in public office to spare no effort to give new impetus to employment,” he said. “This means caring for the dignity of the person.” The Pope touched on the same theme during the homily at his early morning Mass, before a congregation of unwed teenage mothers and their children in the chapel of the Domus Sanctae Marthae, where he lives. In his homily, the Pope said unemployment “is a burden on our conscience” because when society
is organized in such a way that it cannot offer people an opportunity to work, “there is something wrong with that society: It is not right!” “It goes against God himself, who wanted our dignity to begin with (work).” “Power, money, culture do not give us dignity,” he said. “Work, honest work, gives us dignity.” However, he said, “today many social, political and economic systems have chosen to exploit the human person” in the workplace, Continued on page 7