CO Statement distorted • meaning
Father John 0rzanski, the administrator of St Mary's Cathedral, claimed this week that a one paragraph quotation attributed to him in The West Australian completely distorted the meaning of a statement ..
Father Orzanskl said that during a busy Sunday schedule at the cathedral he was asked by The West Australian for his opinion on capital punishment. He supplied a statement of four paragraphs
Instead, only the first paragraph was used in the Monday edition Father Orzanski's full statement reads: "The state has the responsibility to preserve and protect the common good. The church teaches that the state does have the right, basically and in principle, to punish certain serious crimes with the death penalty -in the interests of the common good. Though the state Possesses this right, it must always exercise this right with the greatest justice and prudence. Above all, no one may be sentenced to death unless it is proved beyond reasonable doubt that he or she has actually committed the crime for which the law lays down that penalty. The christian state has always maintained its right to pardon. This implies that the state Is not obliged to execute every criminal guilty of agreat crime. So it ls the prerogative of the state to grant pardon, reprieve or commutation."
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Hope for addicts
ROME: "In the battle against drugs, victory is possible," Pope John Paul told 200 addicts. The pope was speaking at the inaugural Mass of the Paul VI Centre, a new help centre for young people In Rome set up by the Italian Solidarity Centre Organisation which, under Father Mario Picchi, has been helping drug addicts for the past
15 years.
In a gesture symbolic of redemption, the pope baptised five babies whose parents had been cured of their addiction through Father Picchi's therapy. Drugs today constitute an alarming menance, a drama of anguish for many families struck by this scourge, the victims of which are mostly young
.
Meeting challenge .
pope
people who ignore fatal consequences," he said. ''The human factor is vitally important, for the drug problem cannot be faced only with the help of pharmaceuticals but by changing the quality of one's own life." We have to aim at the personal responsibility of the drug user. It is he who first of all has to make the decision to give up drugs."
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Pope John Paul
A decrease in donations to Project Compassion may be due to other factors as well as criticism of the funding of the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace, the national director of Australian Catholic Relief said this week. Significant decreases are noted in some parishes of Perth archdiocese in the I ist on page 2. Mr Michael Whitely, on a visit to Western Australian dioceses, said in Europe where there were no criticisms of the agencies, there had been a similar decline in Lenten donations. This was attributed to large increases in donations in the past two years because of concern for the Ethiopian and North African drought situations.
Michael Whitely
Steady growth
Despite her disability, little Stacey Williams meets and passes the challenge of a "normal pre-school" assimilation, with flying colours. See story and more pictures, page 6 and 7.
In Australia, he said, offerings had increased at 15 per cent a year in recent time. It was indicative of the power of the media to influence people and it was one reason why ACR and other Australian agencies backed the Oz For Africa appeal. This immediate publicity can have spectacular results but no long term effects Mr Whitely said, noting that the most recent Sport Aid event
had raised little profit
above the sponsorships
Mr Whitely said that far fewer people asked for receipts compared with previous years. In Perth
"Even so, the criticisms of the funding of CCJP development education, archdiocese some 25 per identifiable in some par- cent of donors asked for ishes, obviously had an receipts effect on donations. Mr Whitely said that "If the trend continues Australian Catholic Relief throughout Australia it welcomed the enquiry means we have $400,000 Monsignor Nestor would less to help people in make into the question of other countries." ACR funding of developAsked about receipts to ment education by the ensure that donations CCjP. See page 2 were remitted overseas