Religion News Australia 2010 - 21 (May 30 - June 6)
(05 June 10)by Greg Spearritt
Religion News Australia
May 30 – June 6, 2010
Religion news stories from Australia
(Research: Greg Spearritt)
abuse / anglican church / arts & entertainment / buddhism / catholic church / education / international stories / islam / religion & society / other
Still breathing (The Age, Melbourne)
June 1 - IT HAS taken most of her life to discover, but Noreen Wood knows now she is a fighter.
Anglicare charity cash can be used to compensate sex victims (Adelaide Now)
June 2 - THE Anglican Church received advice that it could legally transfer money from its charity organisation, Anglicare, to help pay compensation to sexual abuse victims, it has emerged.
Melbourne priest charged with sexual assault (The Age, Melbourne)
June 5 - A MELBOURNE priest, the subject of a ''mishandled'' internal Catholic Church inquiry, has been charged with sexual assault.
Bishop attacks asylum seeker policies (ABC News)
June 3 - Newcastle Anglican Bishop Brian Farran has condemned what he calls an inhumane approach by both the major political parties towards asylum seekers.
Aborigines need to turn radical (The Australian)
June 5 – (Opinion: Noel Pearson) ON April 3 last year, Anna Bligh used the occasion of the Australian government signing up to the International Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples to reveal that her government had made three declarations under so-called Wild Rivers legislation.
Leaving the Cult (Sydney Morning Herald)
June 2 - Given their pathological religiosity and curiously durable naivety, it's no wonder Americans have made their country the world capital of cults.
A director's guide to religious tolerance (The Age, Melbourne)
June 1 – (Review) Peter Brook is 85 and his voice quavers, I notice, in a way it didn't three years ago.
Legion (Perth Now)
June 5 – (Review) HOT on the heels of Denzel Washington?s atmospheric but heavy-handed The Book of Eli comes another post-apocalyptic tale with religious overtones.
Serendipity on the sand (ABC News)
June 1 - It was a chance encounter on Bondi Beach that would have profound repercussions in the foothills of the Himalayas.
Council prepares for MacKillop influx (ABC News)
June 2 - The Wattle Range Council has outlined more than $11 million in capital works for its draft business plan.
Churchgoers a saviour in time of wine glut (ABC News)
June 4 - With major oversupply issues in the wine industry, one enterprising company has taken the novel approach of selling directly to devotees of the Catholic church.
Religious education teaches tolerance too (ABC News)
June 4 – (Opinion: Michael Jensen) When I went to primary school in the early 80s, my friends included a Vietnamese Catholic, a Pakistani Muslim, a Greek Orthodox and an Anglo-Australian whose parents were not religious at all.
Abuse
Swiss Church gets tough on sex abuse (The Age, Melbourne)
June 3 - Swiss Roman Catholic bishops have toughened rules on sexual abuse by the clergy by agreeing to denounce priests to police if they face strong suspicions of abuse.
Anglican Church
Church may allow divorced bishops (The Age, Melbourne)
June 6 - Divorced clergy could be allowed to become Church of England bishops for the first time, it was reported.
Catholic Church
Priests' 'wives' speak out against celibacy (ABC News)
June 2 - Pope Benedict XVI, still struggling to repair the damage wrought by a wave of paedophile scandals, now faces a fresh challenge - from women loved and abandoned by Catholic priests.
Israeli occupation unjust, says Vatican (Adelaide Now)
June 2 - A VATICAN document leaked overnight calls the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories a "political injustice".
Doubts on Pope's visit (The Age, Melbourne)
June 4 - The Pope's historic visit to Britain is in disarray as the costs spiral and doubts increase over the schedule.
Papal visit to Cyprus
Bishop's murder clouds papal trip to Cyprus (The Age, Melbourne)
June 4 - Pope Benedict XVI was due in Cyprus Friday on a three-day visit clouded by the murder of a Catholic bishop in Turkey and amid regional tension over a deadly Israeli raid on a pro-Palestinian aid flotilla.
Pope calls for 'desire for harmony' in divided Cyprus (The Age, Melbourne)
June 4 - Pope Benedict XVI said he hoped that Cyprus's divided Greek and Turkish communities could find the "desire for harmony" to reach peace as he visited the divided Mediterranean island Friday.
Cyprus president tells pope of hope for peace (The Age, Melbourne)
June 5 - Cypriot President Demetris Christofias received visiting Pope Benedict XVI on Saturday, expressing hope for peace and calling on the world to press Turkey on its occupation of the island's north.
Pope calls for inter-religious dialogue (The Age, Melbourne)
June 6 - Pope Benedict XVI has called for dialogue between Christians and people of other faiths on the second day of his landmark visit to Cyprus, an island divided between Christian and Muslim communities.
Islam
Bangladesh blocks Facebook over prophet drawings (The Age, Melbourne)
May 30 - Bangladesh has blocked the social networking website Facebook over a page urging people to draw images of Islam's Prophet Muhammad, joining Pakistan to become the second South Asian nation to ban the popular site over religious concerns.
Frenchwoman fined over Islamic veil (The Age, Melbourne)
June 4 - French police fined a woman for driving while wearing an Islamic veil, just weeks after a similar incident sparked a major political row, officials said on Thursday.
Religious Violence
Blasphemy laws to blame for Lahore mosque attacks (The Australian)
May 31 - AN attack on two mosques that killed more than 90 members of a "heretic" Muslim sect has thrown the spotlight back on extremists in southern Punjab and prompted calls for Pakistan to repeal controversial blasphemy laws.
Bin Laden's money man killed: report (Sydney Morning Herald)
June 1 - Al-Qaeda has announced the death of a trusted aide to Osama bin Laden and its top leader in Afghanistan, Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, the SITE group which monitors Islamist websites says.
Afghan child brides lashed as officials turn a blind eye (The Age, Melbourne)
June 1 - THE two Afghan girls had every reason to expect the law would be on their side when a policeman at a checkpoint stopped the bus they were in.
Other
Indonesian singer tapping into fame to deliver a message of peace (The Age, Melbourne)
May 31 - WHEN Emha Ainun Nadjib stood on a stage in Birmingham, England, in 2004, singing an Islamic prayer in Arabic to the music of Silent Night, a row of Indonesian nuns waited behind him to sing the carol's actual verse in Indonesian.
God made animals for testing: Malaysian minister (Sydney Morning Herald)
June 1 - A Malaysian minister has defended an Indian company's plans to build an animal testing medicine lab in his state, saying that God created monkeys and rats for experiments to benefit humans.
Grave robber caught stealing holy water (Adelaide Now)
June 2 - A GRAVE robber was today caught stealing a horde of religious memorabilia, including figurines of Christ and bottles of holy water, from two French cemeteries, police said.
Sex scandal: disgraced pastor forms new church (Sydney Morning Herald)
June 3 - Former megachurch pastor Ted Haggard said on Wednesday that he will launch a new church from his US home, three-and-a-half years after he resigned from his ministry amid an embarrassing and devastating sex scandal.
Regular guy Jesus comedy under fire (News.com.au)
June 5 - A COALITION of religious and conservative leaders is trying to stop a proposed US cartoon that puts Jesus Christ in a modern-day context.
Peace prize winner in bid to save sheikh (Sydney Morning Herald)
June 2 - THE Nobel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu is among international human rights leaders who have condemned Australia for its impending deportation of a Muslim cleric, whose battle will draw 1000 protesters to Canberra in a convoy of buses tomorrow.
Also: Sheikh's supporters protest against his deportation (ABC News)
June 3 - Protesters have gathered in Canberra demanding the Federal Government overturn a decision to deport Sheikh Mansour Leghaei.
Passport cancelled for 'extreme religious views' (ABC News)
June 4 - The lawyer for an Australian woman arrested in Yemen says the Federal Government decided to cancel her passport because she held "extreme views of Islam".
Also: Aussie held in Yemen an 'extremist' and a security threat: ASIO (The Australian)
June 5 - AUSTRALIAN spy agency ASIO cancelled the passport of an Australian woman detained in Yemen for the past three weeks because her interpretation of Islam was "extremist" and it believed the 30-year-old English teacher and mother of two was a threat to security in Yemen.
Beneath the veil (The Age, Melbourne)
June 6 - UMM Yusuf, an Australian convert to Islam who lives in suburban Fawkner, is finishing her afternoon prayers.
Who is an atheist? (Sydney Morning Herald)
May 31 – (Opinion: Dick Gross) I somewhat provocatively refer to myself as an ''atheist Jew''.
Fair Work Ombudsman looked into Church of Scientology (Adelaide Now)
June 1 - THE industrial inspectorate has confirmed it is investigating the employment practices of the Church of Scientology.
Hills folk reject oldest profession (Sydney Morning Herald)
June 3 - JESUS may have welcomed prostitutes into the kingdom of heaven, but the reception in Sydney's ''Bible belt'' is distinctly less friendly.
Court orders Jehovah's Witness boy be given blood transfusion (The Australian)
June 5 - A HOSPITAL has won the right to give a child potentially life-saving blood transfusions despite the religious objections of the boy and his family.
The portals to sacredness are anywhere (Herald-Sun, Melbourne)
June 6 – (Opinion: Bryan Patterson) I KNOW a woman who describes her old wooden kitchen table as "sacred space".
Celebrity converts do religions a fatwa lot of good (The Age, Melbourne)
June 6 – (Opinion: Anson Cameron) There's something very cynical about using stars like Cat Stevens to sell faith.
Council moves to non-denominational cemeteries (ABC News)
June 2 - One local council is bracing for a community backlash as it moves toward introducing non-denominational cemeteries.
Girl, 14, raped then set on fire, court told (The Age, Melbourne)
June 2 - A TEENAGER fighting for her life in hospital was raped before her attacker splashed petrol over her and set her alight, an out-of-sessions court heard last night.
Your money or you life - cult leader Rocco Leo's alleged threat (The Australian)
June 4 - DOOMSDAY cult leader Rocco Leo convinced a "profoundly vulnerable" wheelchair-bound follower to hand over her life's savings and be healed - or risk death by gas chamber or beheading.
Man charged with assaulting elderly nun (Sydney Morning Herald)
June 5 - A man has been charged after allegedly kicking a 77-year-old nun in Sydney's west.
From the Archive…
Religion News Australia 2010 - 20 (May 23 - 30)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 19 (May 16 - 23)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 18 (May 9 - 16)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 17 (May 3 - 9)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 16 (Apr 26 – May 3)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 15 (Apr 18 - 26)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 14 (Apr 11 - 18)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 13 (Apr 4 - 11)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 12 (March 28 – Apr 4)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 11 (March 21 - 28)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 10 (March 7 - 21)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 9 (February 28 – March 7)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 8 (February 21 - 28)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 7 (February 14 - 21)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 6 (February 7 - 14)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 5 (February 1 - 7)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 4 (January 24 - 31)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 3 (January 17 - 24)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 2 (January 10 - 17)
Religion News Australia 2010 - 1 (January 2 - 10)
Religion News Australia 2009 - 50 (December 27 – January 2)
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In response to the Advertiser article of June 2 this letter was published by them on June 5.
Dear Editor
Please find a joint letter from Archbishop Jeffrey Driver and Dr Lynn Arnold re recent articles.
They would appreciate publication in full at the earliest opportunity.
“We refer to recent articles which infer that the Anglican Diocese of Adelaide has been seeking to take money from Anglicare SA to fund payments to those who have been abused by church leaders.
Any such inferences are quite misleading. The discussions between the diocese and Anglicare SA have been about those who sadly suffered abuse in Anglicare organisations, before its incorporation in 2000.
Our major concern since the discovery of the cases of abuse is, has been and remains, the welfare of the survivors. It is for their sake, above all other considerations, that we feel it necessary to clarify the situation.
The Diocese of Adelaide accepted responsibility for supporting all who were abused in its care, including those who were abused in Anglicare entities before its incorporation. It entered into discussion with Anglicare SA about how it might support this diocesan response to those who were abused in institutions that are now part of Anglicare SA. This represents nearly half the claims dealt with by the Diocese over the past five years.
As an organisation established for the care and support of the marginalised and needy, Anglicare SA has a moral obligation to explore ways, within its legal and constitutional framework, to support the church as it responds to those who suffered abuse on Anglicare premises or by Anglicare staff in the period before incorporation. Anglicare was incorporated in 2000 and at that time the diocese transferred all relevant assets to the newly incorporated entity.
Both the Diocese of Adelaide and Anglicare SA took legal advice on these matters. The advice to Anglicare Council was that it could not constitutionally transfer funds directly to the support of survivors.
We accepted this advice and every dollar paid to the survivors was from Church funds, not Anglicare.
We have acted at all times in accordance with the Anglicare Constitution and have been publicly transparent in regard to funding responsibilities.
We are deeply concerned at any suggestion or inference that the Diocese of Adelaide or Anglicare SA has acted other than properly in these matters. “
Most Reverend Dr Jeffrey Driver Dr Lynn Arnold AO
Archbishop of Adelaide Chief Executive
President, Anglicare SA Anglicare SA
Posted by Lynn Arnold
