The Seeker: Sister Anne Flanagan: Desperation and the indefensible

The Seeker: Sister Anne Flanagan: Desperation and the indefensible a reflection on the upcoming Bishops The bishops' draft document, entitled "Life-Giving Love in an Age of Technology."

Catechists in Singapore at mass media school

Use the mass media like TV, movies, music, and Internet in catechesis, to better adapt to the vocabulary of students: this is what catechists of the Archdiocese of Singapore are being called to learn in a diocesan training program given by experts and professionals.

According to religious Sister Pauline Rose Pacatte, who holds an MA in Media Education earned in London and who was one of the speakers in the program, catechists must adopt modern means of communication in order to dialogue with students and speak their own language . The sister said that “how you teach is more important than what you teach,” leaving the catechists a "Decalogue" which addresses the need to respect students, learn their language, be antennas in the contemporary world, thinking with the heart and, above all, “combining faith and life,” which is the most important witness and influences their own vision of the mass media. (PA) (Agenzia Fides 10/11/2009)
PHOTO: Graduates from the Advance Certificate in Media Studies in Los Angeles - a course directed by Sr Rose Pacatte.

Building Church on the Rejected Stone

Baptized Christians are fitted into a growing edifice that has Christ as its foundational stone (98). Becoming a Christian means becoming a part of the building erected on the rejected stone. Precisely in this way the Church fulfills the dream of hope, which ultimately supports all human construction. The building done by humans aims at the construction of a place to stay; it seeks security, a home, freedom. It is a declaration of war against death, against insecurity, against fear, against loneliness. For this reason the desire of humans to build is fulfilled in the temple, in that building in which they invited God. The temple is the expression of the human longing to have God as a fellow occupant, the longing to be able to reside with God and thus to experience the perfect way of living, the consummate community, which banishes loneliness and fear once and for all. The true temple of God is indestructible. God himself erects this temple and that dream of God dwelling among his people is fulfilled in those who trust in the rejected stone – they themselves are the temple (cf New Song for the Lord, Joseph Ratzinger).

E-Conference on the Gospel of Luke for over 5,000 prisoners

I was in prison and you visited me -  Sydney (Agenzia Fides) – The Gospel of Luke has entered into the gray walls of the Long Bay Jail in Sydney and in many other detainment centers in Europe and America. It is one of the most inspiring fruits of the e-conference on the Gospel of Luke, held yesterday (November 4) in Brisbane, organized by the Australian Bishops' Conference, with technical assistance from Broken Bay Institute. As Agenzia Fides learns from local Church sources, the conference entitled “St. Luke: Come to the Table” was transmitted on over 200 Internet websites worldwide, with over 5,000 registered participants.

The e-conference on Saint Luke was organized after seeing the great success of the E-Conference on Saint Paul, which was held at the close of the Year of St. Paul. Australian Catholic communities and others from around the world came together to listen to Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Canberra and Goulburn, and Dr. Elizabeth Dowling, Theologian.

The Bishops of Australia have decided to hold the event to create an “e-community” in pastoral ministry and in the Church in Australia's work of evangelization. The event shows that the mass media, put to good use, can be an efficient source of evangelization. Thanks to the web and the new technologies, the conference is followed by faithful from all different cities, parishes, and towns across the country. (PA) (Agenzia Fides 5/11/

Art: beauty, truth and goodness

FRIENDSHIP AND DIALOGUE BETWEEN CHURCH AND ARTISTS

VATICAN CITY, 5 NOV 2009 (VIS) - At midday today in the Holy See Press Office, Archbishop Gianfranco Ravasi, president of the Pontifical Council for Culture and of the Pontifical Commission for the Cultural Patrimony of the Church, and Antonio Paolucci, director of the Vatican Museums, held a press conference to present Benedict XVI's forthcoming meeting with artists, due to take place on 21 November in the Sistine Chapel.

Archbishop Ravasi recalled how the meeting, promoted by his dicastery, is to be celebrated on the tenth anniversary of John Paul II's Letter to Artists of 4 April 1999, and the forty-fifth anniversary of Paul VI's meeting with artists of 7 May 1964.

"The event", he explained, "is not like a general audience of the Holy Father, open to any artist or exclusively to Christian-inspired artists, rather it aims to be representative of the desire for dialogue between the Church and the world of the arts, a dialogue which must necessarily develop over various stages and using various means".

The 255 artists who have accepted the invitation to attend come from various continents and are divided into five categories: painting and sculpture; architecture; literature and poetry; music and song; cinema, theatre, dance and photography.

Social Isolation and New Technology | Pew Internet & American Life Project

Social Isolation and New Technology Pew Internet & American Life Project

The Mystery of Hope

From The Portal of the Mystery of Hope

By Charles Péguy

The faith that I love best, says God, is hope.

Faith doesn’t surprise me.
It’s not surprising.
I am so resplendent in my creation. . . .
That in order really not to see me these poor people would have to be blind.
Charity says God, that doesn’t surprise me.
It’s not surprising.
These poor creatures are so miserable that unless they had a heart of stone,
how could they not have love for one another.
How could they not love their brothers.
How could they not take the bread from their own mouth,
their daily bread, in order to give it to the unhappy children who pass by.
And my son had such love for them. . . .
But hope, says God, that is something that surprises me.
Even me.
That is surprising.
That these poor children see how things are going and believe that tomorrow things will go better.
That they see how things are going today and believe that they will go better tomorrow morning.
That is surprising and it’s by far the greatest marvel of our grace.
And I’m surprised by it myself.
And my grace must indeed be an incredible force.
~trans. David L. Schindler, Jr.