Through the years, dozens of vehicles have been specially tailored by carmakers like Cadillac, Mercedes and Jeep for the needs of the pontiff. Read more

The launching of the jubilee attracted Catholic faithful in Port Moresby who packed the Mary Help of Christians' shrine at Don Bosco Technological Institute (DBTI) for the Eucharist which was celebrated by the Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Michael Banach.

Speaking to the congregation, the Nuncio highlighted the history of the Catholic Church in PNG and how it has been an authentic model to lead the people of God.

As part of the celebration, 5 Bishops representing the 4 regions of PNG and 1 from the diocese of Honiara in Solomon Islands were invited to share their experience and contribution of their region to the church in PNG, Solomon Islands and the universal church.

In 1844, Pope Gregory XVI erected the vicariate apostolic of Melanesia.

A vicariate apostolic is a mission territory under the pastoral care of a bishop.

The vicariate of Melanesia included the present Independent States of Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.

As the Catholic church grew the original vicariate was divided and new vicariates were established.

It was not until 15th November, 1966 that dioceses were established in Papua New Guinea and in the the Solomon Islands.

Port Moresby and Honiara were established as metropolitan archdioceses.

There are now 19 dioceses in Papua New Guinea and 3 in Solomon Islands.

Source

• wantokniuspepa.com
• Image: mw2.google.com

Rev. Chadwick was best known for his work on the Victorian Church of England, Cardinal John Henry Newman and Michael Ramsey.

He wrote a textbook called "The Pelican History of the Church: The Reformation (1964)", which an obituary in The Guardian described as "the first book on many reading lists for a quarter of a century".

Rev. Chadwick held two Cambridge University chairs over a period of 25 years, was Cambridge's vice-chancellor during the student unrest of the late 1960s, and chaired a commission that transformed the structures of the Church of England.

Continue reading

Artefacts from the Hohi Mission Station at Kerikeri have uncovered details about the daily lives of the first permanent European settlers, researchers said.

University of Otago Anthropology and Archaeology Associate Professor Ian Smith and Archaeology Honourary Research Fellow Dr Angela Middleton led the excavation team. Continue reading

As it turned out, the Christendom trilogy served as the last great work of English-Welsh historian and man of letters Christopher Dawson (1889-1970). Sort of. The trilogy derived, originally, from lectures Dawson had delivered while teaching at Harvard University between 1958 and 1962. As desired, the Christendom trilogy would consist of The Formation of Christendom (1967); The Dividing of Christendom (1965); and The Return to Christian Unity. (1) In the broad, each volume represented one of three great periods of the Christian world: the ancient-medieval nexus; the Reformation and Counter Reformation; and the Church in the age of democracy, nationalisms, and ideologies.

Though The Formation of Christendom is technically volume one of Christendom, it came out two years later than volume two, The Dividing of Christendom. The idea to publish the lectures as a trilogy came to Dawson in 1963. His publisher, Frank Sheed, readily agreed. The only question was whether to publish them separately as a three-part work or immediately as a three-volume set. (2) Sheed wanted to get them out as soon as possible, as he hoped the books would serve as the basis of discussions for the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965). Not unreasonably, Sheed had believed that Dawson—along with a number of other Christian Humanists, such as Jacques Maritain and Etienne Gilson—would serve as the intellectual touchstone and fountainhead for the council and its important deliberations and reforms. After all, important figures such as Romano Guardini had been calling for reformation of the liturgy since the 1920s. (3)

Nothing, as it happened, could have been further from the truth. With most Catholic theologians and publishers in the 1960s believing the Holy Spirit to have done away with much of the recent past, few outside of a small number of loyal followers still thought Dawson had much to contribute to the future of Catholicism. Continue reading

Sources

• The Catholic World Report
• Image: The Record

These are stories centered on the enduring French and Catholic influence in Kororareka Russell and the Bay of Islands, specifically the work of Bishop Pompallier and of the Marist missionaries whose South Seas headquarters and printery were then here.