Comensoli will be installed as archbishop on 1 August. He has been the Bishop of Broken Bay in New South Wales for the past three years.

When he is installed, he will take over from recently-retired Archbishop Denis Hart at Melbourne's St Patrick's Cathedral.

It is the largest archdiocese in Australia, with a Catholic population of 1.1 million people.

Hart, who was also President of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference until May this year, says Comensoli is "generous, gifted and faith-filled" and has experience in three dioceses.

Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane, who replaced Hart as the new conference President, says Comensoli has "the gifts and energies that his new mission would require.

"Archbishop-elect Peter has a good mind, an engaging personality and the strong pastoral sense needed in our largest diocese at a complex time like this," Coleridge says.

"He's a man who can listen and a man who can speak not only to Catholic people, but to the wider community as well."

Comensoli says he is humbled Pope Francis had chosen him and recognised "the challenge he has placed before me to lead God's people in Melbourne tenderly, mercifully and joyfully.

"The life of Christian discipleship is a precious gift, developed through hearing and responding to God's call," he says.

"In accepting this call to be a new missionary among God's people of the Archdiocese of Melbourne, I readily acknowledge the great responsibility entrusted to me, along with the frailties I carry."

In acknowledging the "great responsibility" that comes with his new position, Comensoli also spoke of sex abuse and the need to right wrongs.

"I am deeply aware of the painful witness you bear because of the crimes committed in the Church against the most innocent, our children and the vulnerable.

"I share the bewilderment and anger you feel at the failure of Church leaders to believe victims and to respond to them with justice and compassion.

"This is not the way of Jesus Christ. It is our solemn shared duty to right the grievous wrongs of the past and ensure that the future is very different."

Source

• The Tablet
• News.com.au
• The Age
• Image: ccsp.catholic.edu.au

Bill Shorten, who is the party's federal parliamentary leader, has promised the Catholic Bishops' Conference chairman, Bishop Denis Hart, to "arbitrarily" give Catholic schools the $250m in the first two years of government.

Shorten also pledged billions more to come over the next decade.

He made the promise to Hart in the week before a by-election for the Batman seat in the House of representatives.

He reminded Hart of what the party planned to spend on Catholic schools should it win government at the next federal poll.

The measures Shorten outlined are in line with what Labor has promised for nearly a year.

It has been pledging to restore the level of funding schools were originally promised under the Gillard government in 2012.

Labor outlined the difference between what the Turnbull government is giving schools in 2018 and 2019 and its plan.

It says the difference is $1.88 billion for public schools, $250 million for Catholic schools and $53.5 million for the independent sector.

Citing these figures, Mr Shorten wrote: "Catholic schools would be more than $250 million better off in our first two years of government alone."

Shorten's promise has been met with opposition by a public school lobby group.

The group says it is "an arbitrary and partisan move".

The president of the Australian Council of State School Organisations, Phillip Spratt, says Labor has made an "irrational and illogical policy in the scrabble for votes".

On Monday the education minister, Simon Birmingham, told Sky News "there's always somebody who can be bought by a few pieces of silver", suggesting Labor had bought Catholic Education Melbourne's support.

The Catholic education office in Melbourne is said to have intervened in the Batman by-election.

It has been reported as making 30,000 robocalls in favour of Labor's Ged Kearney.

On Tuesday the Labor frontbench MP Brendan O'Connor labelled the comments - apparently comparing the sector to Judas - "disgraceful" and called on Birmingham to apologise.

Source

• The Guardian
• Sydney Morning Herald
• SBS News
• Image: TenPlay

The non-binding referendum drew 7.8 million for same-sex marriage and 4.9 million against.

Australian Catholic Bishops Conference president Archbishop Denis Hart says parliament must work to unify Australians by respecting different views on marriage.

"The Catholic Church, and many others who sought to retain the definition of marriage ... continues to view marriage as a special union between a woman and a man ..." he says.

"A change in civil law does not change the Catholic understanding of the nature of marriage."

Chief executive of Catholic Social Services, Frank Brennan SJ, doesn't think the clear "yes" vote will make Parliament's job easier.

Last Thursday, while the votes were still coming in, he said: "The present mess of Australian politics will not help as our politicians work out how and when to legislate the change.

"Already, there are different proponents for different private members' bills which could be presented first in either House of Parliament."

Brennan wrote about the issue on the Jesuit-operated Eureka Street website.

"Those who have campaigned loudest and longest for a 'no' vote have emphasised threats to other human rights, most especially the right to freedom of conscience, religion and belief. But they are not the only ones ...

"The Senate Select Committee ... [noted]: 'There was common ground between many groups on the need for positive protection for religious freedom.

"'The Human Rights Law Centre and other organisations in support of same-sex marriage recognised the need for Australian law to positively protect religious freedom.'The issue of religious freedom must be addressed'."

Brennan went on to quote Anna Brown, who is Director of the Human Rights Law Centre and former Spokeswoman for the Equality Campaign:

"Religious freedom should be protected in law. Indeed, we are on record in a number of inquiries supporting the addition of religious belief to protections under federal anti-discrimination law."

The UN Human Rights Committee in Geneva is also concerned, Brennan says. In a recent report, the Committee was bothered by "the lack of direct protection against discrimination on the basis of religion at the federal level ...".

The Committee also noted "a parliamentary inquiry on the status of the human right to freedom of religion or belief is underway."

"No" voters are also concerned about religious freedom.

They argue protections for freedom of religion should be inserted in the amended Marriage Act, especially to ensure:

• the right to refuse to conduct same-sex marriages
• protection for employees
• protection for churches as employers and property holders
• protection for churches as educators
• protection for parents' and guardians' right to teach their children according to their religious faith
• protection for parents' and guardians' right to spare their children teachings inconsistent with their religious faith.

Source

• Catholic Leader
• The Tablet
• Eureka Street
• Vicky Beeching.com

The Church's threats come as opponents and supporters of marriage equality stand firm to their view while the countdown to the federal government's postal vote to decide the issue continues.

The Archbishop of Melbourne, Denis Hart, says the church's 180,000 employees are expected to uphold Church teachings "totally", and defiance would be treated "very seriously".

"I would be very emphatic that our schools, our parishes exist to teach a Catholic view of marriage," he says.

"Any words or actions which work contrary to that would be viewed very seriously.

"Our teachers, our parish employees are expected totally to uphold the Catholic faith and what we believe about marriage. People have to see in words and in example that our teaching of marriage is underlined."

He also points out that like all other employers, the Church "should be able to ensure its values are upheld by those who choose to work for the organisation."

Archbishop Timothy Costelloe, who is the chairman of the Bishops Commission for Catholic Education adds voice to Hart's, saying teachers should be careful about undermining their schools' values if marriage laws are changed.

Parents who send their children to Catholic schools want them educated within a Catholic context, of which marriage is a vital part, Costelloe notes.

Australia's anti-discrimination laws allow churches to hire and fire on the basis of sexual orientation, marital status and other traits.

Last week, the 'Yes' campaign announced Olympic legend Ian Thorpe as the official face of its campaign in favour of changing the Marriage Act.

Source

• The Sydney Morning Herald
• Huffington Post
• Newshub
• Image: Business Insider

The Commission wants legislation introduced to jail people who fail to report child sexual abuse, including priests.

In response, Australian Catholic Bishops Conference chair, Archbishop Denis Hart says while the church is "absolutely committed" to reporting child abuse disclosed to them outside of confession, priests have an "absolute moral obligation" to preserve the secrecy of the confessional.

They should accept a prison term rather than reveal the contents of a sacramental confession, Hart says.

"What goes on in the confessional is between God and the person and I am there for them to know that they are forgiven," he says.

In the Commission's view, however: "The right to practice one's religious beliefs must accommodate civil society's obligation to provide for the safety of all and, in particular, children's safety from sexual abuse.

"Institutions directed to caring for and providing services for children, including religious institutions, must provide an environment where children are safe from sexual abuse. Reporting information relevant to child sexual abuse to the police is critical to ensuring the safety of children."

Changing the law to reflect the Commission's recommendations may not be straightforward.

As Hart points out, the laws in Australia "and in many other countries recognise the special nature of confession as part of the freedom of religion, which has to be respected."

Other high-profile clerics are backing Hart, including Jesuit priest and lawyer Frank Brennan.

"If there is a law that says that I have to disclose it [perpetrators' sex abuse confessions], then yes, I will conscientiously refuse to comply with the law," Brennan told The Australian.

"All I can say is that in 32 years no one has ever come near me and confessed anything like that.

"And instituting such a law, I say, simply reduces rather than increases the prospect that anyone ever will come and confess that to me."

The CEO of the Australian Catholic Church's Truth Justice and Healing Council, Francis Sullivan, says if the law is changed priests will have to make personal, conscience decisions that will have to be dealt with by the authorities in accordance with the new law.

Source

• Catholic Culture
• Catholic Herald
• New York Times
• Sky News Australia
• Image: Newcastle Herald
  

Archbishop Hart told Australia's Royal Commission on Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse that a conviction was often not sufficient to have a priest defrocked.

"There was a leaning in favour of a priest who might have been accused of something," he said.

"We found that a conviction was not enough to have a priest laicised by Rome."

Since 2001, Archbishop Hart said he had the power to suspend priests and recommend their being removed from the clerical state.

"Every living priest who has been convicted of sexual misconduct has been referred to Rome for laicisation," he said.

But he admitted he only began directing suspended priests to cease wearing clerical garb in 2011.

Archbishop Hart also admitted that purportedly heartfelt letters to victims sent by himself and his predecessor then-Archbishop George Pell for a decade, were, in fact, form letters drafted by staff in consultation with lawyers, with only the names changed.

Archbishop Hart said he had been unable to know confidential details.

In the past year, he had tried to get at least some minimal information about victims' cases so the letters could be more personal.

"It was never indicated to me that this was unhelpful. Had it been, I would have certainly acted sooner," he said.

The letters were sent as part of settlements under the Church's Melbourne Response, set up in 1996 to handle allegations of clergy sex abuse in the archdiocese.

Since 1996, Melbourne archdiocese has paid out about A$10 million to 326 victims without accepting liability for their child abuse claims.

Archbishop Hart said there had been a tendency to minimise sexual abuse by priests in the past.

"I would have to admit that with what we have been doing now shows that there was too much of a tendency to minimise the seriousness of the matter, and I repudiate that totally," he said.

A controversial cap on payments to victims by Melbourne archdioceses is being reviewed by a federal judge appointed by Archbishop Hart.

The archbishop also said he regretted telling a family whose daughter had suffered horrific abuse at a Melbourne school that their civil claim would be "strenuously defended".

The girl subsequently committed suicide.

Sources

• The Guardian
• Herald Sun
• The Age
• The Age
• Image: The Telegraph

The Australian news site The Age reported that the excommunication document - written in Latin - was dated May 31.

Reynolds, who resigned as a parish priest in 2011 and last year founded Inclusive Catholics, said he had expected to be laicised (defrocked), but not excommunicated.

"In times past excommunication was a huge thing, but today the hierarchy have lost such trust and respect," Reynolds was quoted by The Age.

"I've come to this position because I've followed my conscience on women's ordination and gay marriage," he said.

Excommunication is the strongest sanction and means one can not hold any office or receive any sacraments. Being laicised means one is no longer a priest.

In the same article, Melbourne Archbishop Denis Hart said Reynolds was excommunicated because after his priestly faculties were withdrawn he continued to celebrate the Eucharist publicly and preach contrary to the teachings of the church.

Reynolds is not the first Australian Catholic to be excommunicated. Sister Mary MacKillop was excommunicated by her local bishop but was reinstated. In 2010 she became Australia's first saint.

Sources

The Age

Huffington Post

NCR Online

Image: Angela Wylie/The Age

At the end of their twice-yearly conference in Sydney, the bishops said they had formed a supervisory group of representatives from the bishops' conference and Catholic Religious Australia.

They said this group would establish and oversee the 10-member Council for the Royal Commission.

The conference president, Archbishop Denis Hart of Melbourne, said the new council would help the Church engage closely with the commission and the community.

He said expert lay people, including those with expertise in the care of sex abuse victims, would be on the council but he did not give any names.

"We need broad-based expertise so that the church together can face the truth, can provide a better response to the care of victims and also make Australia a safer place for our children," he said.

The bishops' statement welcomed the establishment of the royal commission.

"It is an opportunity for those who have suffered to obtain a compassionate hearing, justice and further healing," the bishops said.

"It is also an opportunity for the Church's processes to be scrutinised with greater objectivity. This will allow further refinements that seek justice and pastoral care.

"However imperfectly, this work has been going on in the Catholic Church for the last two decades. It will continue.

"Once again, we renew our heartfelt apology to those whose lives have been so grievously harmed by the evil perpetrated upon them by some priests, religious and church personnel . . . .

"Our hope is that, in its search for truth, the royal commission will present recommendations ensuring the best possible standards of child protection in our country," the bishops said.

"Painful and difficult as this might be for the Church, it is nothing compared to the hurt of those who have suffered sexual abuse, particularly by clergy and religious."

Sources:

Catholic Church in Australia

SBS

Sydney Morning Herald

Image: Press TV