Interactive Bible studies in Fiji are helping to break the silence over gender violence. The House of Sarah, part of the Anglican Diocese of Polynesia, is running workshops looking at how scripture can help end violence against women. House of Sarah’s gender specialist, Tupou Vere, says they’ve found the workshops a useful way to discuss Read more
A new study found that over the last decade, 15 percent of people in Tuvalu (population 10,857), 10 percent of people in Nauru (population 10,084) and 1.3 percent of people in Kiribati (population 103,058) moved abroad. Many others — about 10,000 — tried to migrate, but could not. Others became “internal migrants,” placing strains on Read more
Climate change—much like ethnic cleansing—singles out certain populations, presenting migration problems every bit as serious as those of political, religious, and ethnic refugees. Extinction is hardly less serious than genocide, yet its quarry have no legal basis to relocate. Pasifika nations have little to no voice in international energy policy, and exert, at most, limited Read more
Pope Francis received Samoa’s prime minister, Tuilaepa Aiono Sailele Malielegaoi, in audience on December 3. Following the audience, Malielegaoi met with Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s Secretary of State, and Msgr. Antoine Camilleri, the Under-Secretary for Relations with States. The discussion focused on some aspects of the social and economic life of Samoa. The valued Read more
The Melanesian Way could aptly be summed up as a democracy says Phil Fitzpatrick. He points out that there are various definitions of democracy, “but the Oxford English Dictionary probably sums it up accurately saying it is ‘a system of government in which all the people of a state or polity… are involved in making Read more
Brother David Lavin has been appointed as the incoming principal to St. Joseph’s College at Alafua in Samoa. Lavin is a member of the Marist Brothers (FMS). He replaces Brother Siaosi Ioane. Lavin has a bachelor’s degree in anthropology, English and history from the University of Auckland, a master’s degree in religious education from the Australian Read more
The Cook Islands Ministry of Health has told the country’s only gynecologist to stop making appointments at the Epsom Day Clinic in Auckland for women who want an abortion. “Before, I could ring and make an appointment at the Epsom Day Unit, so they could go there,” Doctor May Aung has told the Cook Islands Read more
Micah Puia lives in a shanty town on a dirty beach in Honiara, the capital of the Solomon Islands. He is 11 years old, and has lived here all his life. He sleeps in a raised fibro hut. He lives with his grandparents and several cousins, attends second grade at a local school and swims Read more
The director of the Christian Care Centre, Ruth Hope, says more than 500 women, girls and children are under their care, the highest ever recorded at the centre. The Christian Care centre in the Solomon Islands is run by a handful of Anglican nuns, one of whom doubles as a nurse. The Christian Care Centre Read more
The Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples strongly denied accusations of cronyism in renting out properties in Rome. The Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples promotes evangelisation and missionary cooperation around the globe and has special responsibility for bishops, dioceses and developing jurisdictions in Africa, the Far East and parts of the Pacific and Latin Read more