A protester who is alleged to have smashed glasses and threatened people with a Maori patu at a gay wedding expo appeared in court last Friday. The protester, Alexander David Course from Waikaretu, Waikato, faced three charges in Auckland District Court, including having an offensive weapon in a public place. He gatecrashed the Gay Wedding Read more
More gamblers are abandoning their children at Auckland’s SkyCity casino. Last year 49 children under 14 were left unattended by their parents at the casino’s central city site, including in its vast underground car park. The figure for 2011 was 42. The numbers are revealed in the company’s Host Responsibility report to the Gambling Commission, Read more
The Board of Trustees of St Patrick’s College Wellington, New Zealand has appointment Mr Neal Swindells as the the school’s 24th Rector. For the past 15 years Neal has been the principal of St John’s College in Hastings, He will take up the position in January 2014 and will be welcomed formally to the College at Read more
When the line-up for next year’s Mission Estate Winery Concert was announced this week, it was billed as the UK Invasion Party. The Concert will feature Ronan Keating, Melanie C from the Spice Girls, Sharon Corr, Billy Ocean and Leo Sayer. However branding Irish musicians Ronan Keating and Sharon Corr as Brits has upset Hawke’s Bay’s Irish community. Read more
Principal of Christchurch’s Our Lady of Victories School, Barbara Perry, claimed her suspension on October 11 was unjustified and “the culmination of a course of conduct designed to remove her as principal”. Now, an Employment Relations Authority (ERA) decision has ruled that she be reinstated from yesterday (Monday) and that mediation between the two parties Read more
Philadelphia Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, a leading conservative in the Roman Catholic hierarchy, defended himself Tuesday against perceptions that he is hostile to the more liberal inclusiveness of Pope Francis. “I think the question is: Is there a discontinuity between the leadership of Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict, and the new kind of Read more
A South Korean newspaper reports that dozens have been executed in North Korea; in at least one case, in front of 10,000. If true, it could signal a new wave of repression for the brutal regime. North Korea’s brutal and secretive regime may have unleashed a new wave of repression, executing dozens of people in Read more
The newly elected leader of the United States’ Roman Catholic bishops says he will draw on his years as a pastor while seeking to reconcile Pope Francis’ message of a welcoming church with the conservative ideology of American bishops. Archbishop Joseph Kurtz of Kentucky was elected Tuesday as president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Read more
The Second General Assembly of the Catholic Church in Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands devoted the third full day of works to the themes of Evangelization and Inculturation. Bishop Otto Separi of Aitape connected his reflection with the Synod on the New Evangelization last year in Rome of which he was a member. Fr. Read more
After a five-year engagement and months of busking to raise funds, a Lyttelton couple have become the first to be wed in the Transitional Cardboard Cathedral. Jill Jefferies and James Dobinson, who both have Down syndrome, married on Saturday before about 100 well-wishers, family and friends. The couple had busked at the Lyttelton Farmers Market Read more