A four-month drought in the central Tongan island group of Ha’apai is putting stress on drinking water supplies already diminished by saltwater intrusion. Some people – especially women and children mostly affected by the water shortage – from the more remote communities are needing to travel long distances to get water from churches and schools Read more
Archbishop Peter Loy Chong continues to maintain that as a theologian, he could not compromise on his belief that religion was a public matter. He made a distinction between the idea of a secular state and the idea that religion is private. “We do not have a problem with Fiji being called a secular state,” Read more
The Archbishop of Suva, Fiji, Peter Loy Chong says that Christians and non-Christians should challenge the Constitution because faith is not supposed to be private. The Constitution protects the right of every person either individually or in community with others, in private or in public, to manifest and practise their religion or belief in worship, Read more
The PNG Health Department will provide the 172 unregistered church-run health facilities with funding assistance. Health Secretary Pascoe Kase says Kase said about 20% of the church-run institutions were not registered or recognised by the Government. “A lot of the health infrastructures were put in by the churches themselves many years ago even before the government Read more
Twelve youths from Bairaman in the Ralopal Concession area under the Sigete/Mukus Special Agriculture and Business Lease (SABL) Project Site in East New Britain have been arrested and charged for allegedly threatening logging company workers. Police in Kokopo said the men were arrested and charged for threatening workers at a conservation land area in Pomio. Read more
The Attorney General of Fiji Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum had drawn a distinction between schools with ethnic names and schools with religious names. He says schools with ethnic names are not fully inclusive of other races but schools with religious names are OK. Speaking at Ahmadiyya Muslim Secondary School prize-giving ceremony in Voloca, Dreketi, he said, “Take Read more
The Church of Melanesia’s Board of Mission is helping the people of the Malaita Province, in the Solomon Islands, to adapt to the rising sea level. In the Solomon Islands, the sea level rises of 8 millimetres per year, almost three times the global average, survival of communities on the low-lying atoll of Ontong Java Read more
Asylum-seekers transferred from Australia to Pacific island detention centres, including survivors of torture and trauma and unaccompanied children, are living in arbitrary detention and harsh physical conditions that do not meet international standards In his recent Apostolic Exhortation, Evangelii Gaudium Pope Francis calls for generosity towards migrant people. He says, “Migrants present a particular challenge Read more
Pastor Su’e Su’e, his wife Antonina and their children have moved from Samoa to begin a Samoan-language church in Whittier, Alaska. The newly founded church is Malamalama Fou, which translates as “New Light Church.” In August, the first-time pastor and his family moved up to Alaska. “We did everything by faith,” said Su’e, “Everything is Read more
Papua New Guinea’s justice minister has told parliament he will enforce the nation’s death penalty laws. Kerenga Kua told the chamber last Thursday a government task force had visited Texas in the United States, Indonesia and Thailand to gauge the mechanics of how to implement it, the Post Courier reported. “A full report has been Read more