On Instagram, Angela Pan’s wedding looks perfect. At her hen’s party in Auckland, she sports a train of balloons in millennial pink. In a short video, gentle music accompanies an unboxing of her gift boxes for bridesmaids, featuring customised wallet pouches and fluffy slippers. In a crisp white dress, she kisses her new husband Joseph Read more
A century ago, one in five people who died in New Zealand were killed by an infectious disease. Infectious diseases, as a group, took more lives in 1922 than heart disease. Twice as many people were killed by communicable viruses or bacteria as died of all forms of cancer combined. These days, heart disease and Read more
Chaos defines a leader. Albert Einstein wrote ‘the stupid need order; the genius masters chaos.’ A sympathetic translation could be ‘while the majority need an ordered world, a genius is needed to master a chaotic one’. The genius can see beyond the current chaotic circumstances by seeing the order in the chaos. Chaos is not Read more
We have come a long way since the liturgy of the word was that part of the Mass we could miss and still fulfill our Sunday obligation! It was the next part of the Mass that mattered because the presence of Christ in the Sacrament was so special. But nearly 60 years after the Second Read more
Putin has changed my prayer! When the Kremlin-initiated military operation began in February, I was looking at several television networks (BBC, Al Jazeera, DW) in horror at what was happening over the following weeks through March and April. I found myself in tears, shocked and aghast at how people could inflict such devastation on their Read more
When a heterosexual relationship breaks down, women are at a much higher risk of falling into poverty than men – especially if they have children to care for. Our new research suggests that while a breakup, on average, reduces men’s disposable household income by 5%, on average women’s household income decreases by almost 30%. We Read more
In 1982, a new Catholic fell in love with the prayers of the Mass. Those words fed me in many ways: as music for the ear, wisdom for the mind and food for the soul. There was only one problem. The words went too fast for this new convert. I wanted our priest would slow Read more
It is no fun being a bishop these days. After the recent resignations of Cardinal Philippe Barbarin of Lyon and Archbishop Michel Aupetit of Paris, and then the controversial legacies left by Archbishop Jean-Pierre Cattenoz in Avignon and Bishop Emmanuel Lafont in Cayenne (French Guyana), as well as the severe sanction that forced the Diocese Read more
Anne Barrett Doyle of the group BishopAccountability.org recently wrote a thoughtful article on how Pope Francis’ major law to hold bishops and religious superiors accountable for abuse they commit or cover up, Vos Estis Lux Mundi (“You Are the Light of the World”), is not working. That article caused me to reflect on the long-standing, Read more
The Vatican announced on Friday that Pope Francis has been forced to cancel his July 2-7 visit to two countries in Africa due to a knee ailment, the exact nature of which it has never made public. The abrupt cancellation of the trip, which had just been confirmed on May 28, intensified concerns over the Read more