The need for Catholic educators to adapt religion to the modern classroom, operating amidst lower levels of religious literacy, has produced some good results in the Brisbane archdiocese. Their new RE program, Religion, Meaning and Life has been offered as a pilot course to Yr 11 and Yr 12 students across 17 Catholic schools since 2020 with an emphasis on personal reflection and dialogue in the classroom. Plus evaluation results among post-school students showed considerably raised interest in RE and in the worth of Catholic education more broadly.

Guests are Associate Professor Bill Sultmann, Deputy Dean of Australian Catholic University’s La Salle Academy, Mark Craig, Education Officer at Brisbane Catholic Education, and Catherine Rodden, Lead Education Advisor RE for Brisbane Catholic Education.

Further reading:

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First up in this new series Geraldine speaks with Dr Monica Dutton who leads the Sisters of the Good Samaritan Study and Mentoring (SAM) Program, helping lay women aged 30+ to pursue theological training. Now in its third year, with the support of male congregation leaders in Australia, the program offers mentoring, spiritual accompaniment and financial assistance to equip women to become future leaders in their chosen fields including education, chaplaincy and canon law.

Further reading/listening:

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Guests were Sr Nathalie Becquart XMCJ, Undersecretary of the Synod of Bishops; Kirsty Robertson, CEO Caritas Australia; Paul McClintock AO, Chairman of Metlife Care, Director Catholic Health Australia, Chairman St Vincent's Health Australia; and Chiara Porro, Australian Ambassador to the Holy See.

You'll hear Sr Nathalie describe her role at the Vatican and now attending a wide range of different international synodal discussions. Paul McClintock eloquently teases out what's asked of people who realise, to their surprise, that they may need to think of themselves as 'church leaders'. Kirsty Robertson is inspirational, describing the commitment of women in the region. And Ambassador to the Holy See Chiara Porro said she really had noticed the power of the global Church to convene highly effective gatherings tackling entrenched disadvantage.

The discussion was recorded at The Chapel, in the Bethany Centre of the Diocese of Parramatta on Friday February 3. It is also available on the diocese's YouTube channel here.

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Extra reading:

This podcast is hosted by ZenCast.fm

In this new episode, Geraldine speaks to Archbishop Tim Costelloe, president of the Australian Bishops Council and Bishop Shane Mackinlay, bishop of Sandhurst in Victoria and vice-president of the Plenary Council. Speaking during afternoon breaks of the bishops’ regular November meeting, they both reflect on the significant impact of Australia’s five year Plenary Council journey; on the eventful two public sessions, on how many Australians Catholics chose to contribute while also recognising how many in and out of the pews probably knew little about proceedings. And they have both met Pope Francis in these last couple of months and reported, personally, on the experience for them and others, of such ambitious gatherings. In Bishop Mackinlay’s words, “I told the Pope the Church in Australia was alive”.

For those in Sydney, Bishop Mackinlay is speaking in the afternoon at 1.30, Nov 13 at the Crypt at St Patrick’s in The Rocks, as a guest of Catalyst For Renewal. It should be a very good conversation and all are welcome.

Here is the promised bonus episode in this series.

It offers a very rich---and bracingly realistic set of observations---about a Council from a seasoned Church participant, Fr David Ranson.

He was secretary to the Council and deeply absorbed, as you'll hear, in the lead-up, in the events of the week itself and now in assessing what comes next.

He might surprise you with his judgements. They're delivered by a man with an acute sense of Church procedures but also with an eye to possibilities. Let me know what you think.

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It's wrap-up time after a very big week in the life of the Church.

Listen and ponder these first thoughts from two key contributors to the Council: Sr Patty Fawkner, head of the Good Samaritan Sisters and a member of the Council organising committee.

Alongside Emeritus Professor John Warhurst, who was a scrutineer at the Council, ensuring the propriety of voting. He's a prominent member of the Concerned Catholics for Church Reform group from the Canberra-Goulburn diocese. They both feel transformational moments occurred but that there is much to come still, to ensure a welcoming, holy and world-facing Church.

Thanks for listening! Join the conversation at the Facebook page "Plenary Matters" or email [email protected]

Well prepare yourself for some powerful listening in this episode. Two guests join me who've been at the core of events this past week of surprises at the 2nd Assembly...and they're still pretty raw from the sheer intensity of it all.

First Archbishop Mark Coleridge, who as President of the Australian Catholic Bishops Council, persuaded his confreres to call this Council back in 2015, in an inspired moment following the Rome 2015 Synod on the Family.

Then Dr Maeve Heaney joins me, a feisty but faithful theologian/liturgist, who's President of the Aust Catholic Theological Assn (ACTA) plus Director of the Xavier Centre for Theological Formation and one of the launchers of the Xavier School of Preaching, in the Canberra-Goulburn archdiocese. I hope they convey some of the acute emotions on display this week: suggesting a Church far from Death Row, as has occasionally been the public impression portrayed over the last few years.

Geraldine gives a preview of the big final day of the Plenary Council.

There'll be another longer episode out this afternoon.

Well today, day 3, really drew out the latent tensions and challenges always inherent in this Plenary Council process, ones that could not be dodged for much longer. It is not entirely clear as I write, what the final vote will be on issues around men and women’s status in the Church. So this issue could hardly be more significant.

It would appear (I am choosing my words carefully because a lot is opaque) that neither the broader members (the Consultative voters) nor the Bishops (Deliberative voters) gave these moves the requisite majority today. It is possible that the final motion lumped together a range of strands which proved too much for various members, lay and ordained alike. Emotions tipped over apparently within the Assembly and must have raised alarm bells. Because all the scheduled debates have been moved and the whole group sent back for further ‘discernment’: in other words code for ‘re-draw the motions’. Go back and re-think seems to be the message. It’s the first real set of clashes around nuance, tone and theology to my eyes. Virginia Bourke, a prominent Melbourne lay-woman well-known in health and legal realms in Victoria, will bring us up to speed in the second part of today’s pod. She is a lawyer, chair of Mercy Health and St John Ambulance Victoria and just appointed as pro-chancellor of the Australian Catholic University.

My first guest is Christopher Lamb - the Rome correspondent for the vital London Tablet magazine. He has been brought out for a range of speaking duties including the Helder Camara Lecture in Melbourne next week and one at Parramatta Diocese last night, as guest of Bishop Vincent Leong. He outlines the hostility to Francis from particular quarters but thinks Francis is playing “the long game” of finally seeing Vatican Two put into practice. It’s fascinating.

Today’s discussions about women and men was a bit of a wake-up call for optimists like me.

Two key issues have been on the discernment and consideration list for the Plenary Council members these past two days:

Reconciliation: Healing Wounds, Receiving Gifts - with an apology to Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander peoples and the role of Catholic education in the life of the Church. And as we'll hear, in the wider Australian community.

In this episode, Geraldine speaks to John Lochowiak, chair of NATSICC, the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Catholic Council, born in Cooper Pedy to an Aboriginal mother and Polish father.

And to Jacinta Collins, head of the National Catholic Education Commission, and former Labor Senator.

Both guests are intimately connected with these stories. In their different ways, they bring alive big visions for the role played in the past by the Church, where it could include new elements of worship and especially in the case of education, where it could broadcast how much it has offered wider society and why it will continue to do so.

Thanks for listening! Join the conversation at the Facebook page "Plenary Matters" or email [email protected]