Post containing homilies and lay reflections of interest.
A large and growing percentage of our population, particularly the young, have moved away from practising the traditional Christian faith of the mainstream churches. A very close and very spiritual friend of mine wrote: “My deceased wife gave up attending…
Fr Pedro About 9 years ago, newly ordained Fr Pedro Gomez arrived in Battambang City to work in the parish where the Spanish Jesuit bishop Kike had already lived for some 20 years. The parish gave support to Homelands –…
Sr Norma Pimentel is a Catholic Religious Sister in the United States, and a member of the Sisters of the Missionaries of Jesus. Sr Norma is Director of the “Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley” in Texas. This charity…
During the week I was involved in a Memorial Service for a man whose mother was raped at the age of 13, and so he was placed in an orphanage. There the priest molested him, and the nuns treated him…
It is unlikely you have heard of the name of Sydney man, and long-standing parish & St Vincent de Paul member, Stan Arneil. He published his “One Man’s War” book years ago. The book is the publication of his secret…
In today’s readings we learn about various ways to seek reconciliation with someone who has offended us as individuals or as a community. Prophets in the Old Testament were often reluctant carriers of God’s messages to recalcitrant rulers and evil…
Many years ago, in another parish I met a middle-aged man who suffered greatly from mental health issues. He had been in one of the institutions for those with mental health problems, but when the government closed down those institutions…
In about May, 2010, I was sitting at a boarding-house for misplaced youth in a northern Cambodian city called Battambang. The boarding house was called Homelands. It was a temporary home for Cambodia children/adolescents who had been discovered in nearby…
I have some very good friends who came to Australia from overseas. At the moment they are in a conflict situation with their neighbours. My friends feel that a hidden factor in the conflict is the fact that they and…
One Saturday afternoon last year I was having a cup of coffee in a little café in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. It is near the local World Vision HQ. The World Vision hall was rented by the Catholic community for the…
