Longhurst's comments, reported in the widely read publication La Croix International, are strongly critical of the very people from whom he receives his daily bread.

New Zealand's Catholic bishops employ him to teach at Te Kupenga Catholic Theological College.

He is also the leader of SNAP - the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.

Citing numerous broken promises, inadequate responses and apparent lack of accountability, Longhust (pictured) says "They [the bishops] have brought great shame on the New Zealand Catholic Church".

He says the bishops are overlooking the recommendations of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care and adds that its final report, which shows their lack of accountability and transparency in responding to pervasive abuse, merits serious condemnation.

"Given such a finding, perhaps it would be best for the local Church and New Zealand society if those church leaders, the bishops, tendered their resignations to the pope" he says.

The problem is longstanding and is not just about the current leaders, Longhurst points out.

He says 22 years ago, a bishops' pastoral letter on abuse said "We give you an assurance of our commitment to confront this problem with openness and transparency".

Despite this assurance, the Inquiry found the Catholic bishops did not honour this commitment.

"Evidently they are not capable of making the required changes" Longhurst says.

"By such repetitive misbehaviour, they are keeping us all at risk, endangering more children and vulnerable people in the care of New Zealand's Catholic Church.

"Therefore, they themselves must be changed. They must resign."

Episcopal accountability

After publication of the Royal Commission's final report, the Catholic bishops promised "to ensure that the findings and recommendations of this significant Inquiry are not lost or confined to words in a report" Longhurst explains.

Longhurst has accused the bishops and congregational leaders of a lack of transparency.

He says he has had no response from the bishops.

Survivors appeal

Catholic survivors in New Zealand have appealed to Pope Francis three times since 2022 to ask him to hold the bishops to account.

They also asked him to respect his own calls for openness and transparency in dealing with survivors' complaints.

In addition, they asked Francis to help dismantle what they continue to call the local church's system of coverup and denial that is harming so many people.

So far they have not had a reply.

Source

• La Croix

The Most Rev. Anthony Randazzo of Broken Bay, Australia (pictured left), who is President of the Federation of Catholic Bishops Conference of Oceania, (New Zealand, Australia and the South Pacific Islands) says thousands of networks will be developed.

They will be used to provide pastoral and practical assistance, and better employment and healthcare to thousands of migrants and refugees.

After making the initial announcement last month in Rome where he had been attending the Synod on Synodality, Randazzo said the Migrant and Refugee Oceania Network will serve as a unifying voice offering much-needed support for the region's unique challenges.

"This is what a Synodal Church looks like - where words are supported by actions that foster and generate real human relationships, a region not on the periphery but a region in which we live and work together in solidarity, making sure no-one is forgotten" he said.

The region

Oceania's four episcopal conferences are based in New Zealand, Australia, Florida (the Episcopal Conference of the Pacific) and in Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands (located in PNG).

The region covers a vast area of the Pacific. Of the 41-million people living in Oceania, international migrants make up almost 22 percent of the population.

Over a million of those originating in Oceania stay within the region.

Oceania faces unique and increasing challenges as a result of climate change, rising sea levels, floods, cyclones, droughts and disease.

What the support network will do

The Network will identify urgent problems and build programmes to respond to and protect the needs of people displaced within and across Oceania.

This will require cooperation and advocacy for the region at international levels.

The four episcopal conferences have committed to sharing information, skills, resources and practices.

The conferences will also connect smaller Pacific Island countries and dioceses through the International Catholic Migration Commission (ICMC) and the Dicastery for Integral Human Development at the Holy See.

"The key focus of this Synod is one of listening, dialogue and discernment, and that is very much the essential part of our shared journey in Oceania where every voice matters" Randazzo says.

"To counter the dominant voice from the North that forgets the vulnerable people and region from Oceania, we need to lead by example" he says.

"We can do this by calling others back to the Christian faith, not because we are dominant or powerful, but because we are walking with our brothers and sisters in Christ.

"Labelling us in Oceania as the periphery is unhelpful when we are proclaiming the Christian Gospel as one people in Christ.

"Together we can offer direct practical support as well as bringing our needs to the attention of the global community.

"This will lead to renewal, unity and a future filled with hope" Randazzo says.

Source

• BB Catholic

Butler (pictured) will represent New Zealand's Catholic priests at the gathering from 28 April to 2 May.

He and 300 confreres from across the globe will share views and experiences at the "Parish Priests for the Synod: An International Meeting".

Their input is being sought to help prepare for the Synod on Synodality's second session this October.

The parish priests were chosen because they meet the selection criteria set by the Vatican for bishops' conferences.

These criteria expect those selected to have "significant experience in the perspective of a synodal Church" while also ensuring attendees are from "a variety of pastoral contexts".

Priests views sought

Butler says he has written to New Zealand's priests recently explaining his trip's purpose.

While noting he can't possibly represent everyone, he wants them to tell him about how they are finding the synodal process.

He says he hasn't always been engaged with the process himself.

"While I wasn't hugely involved with the Synod process at the parish level when it began, when I became Local Administrator I became very involved."

He now sees the experience quite differently.

"It's a wonderful way to hear what the Holy Spirit has to say to us from people whose voices are not always heard."

The meeting

During the five-day meeting, the parish priests will participate in roundtable discussions, liturgical celebrations, workshops on pastoral proposals, and dialogue with experts.

By listening to and valuing each other's experience of parish priests, they'll have the opportunity to experience and contribute to the "dynamism of synodal work at a universal level".

Their discussions will contribute to the Instrumentum Laboris - the working document for this October's synod assembly.

"I'm looking forward to the experience and the chance to meet Pope Francis there, something I never thought I would experience" he says.

Source

• New Zealand Catholic Bishops Conference

"Our hearts break at the death and destruction we are seeing on our television screens and in our newspapers," they wrote last week during the assembly of the Federation of Catholic Bishops Conferences of Oceania in Fiji.

"We know that God is close to those that suffer. We pray that your people sense the love and care of their brothers and sisters around the world, including from Oceania.

"One of the key themes of our Federation ... is the connectedness of human suffering and the suffering of our world. We have seen in your countries how natural disasters can wreak such pain and anguish, with thousands of lives lost.

"The Catholic Church has established appeals to raise funds to support the ongoing efforts for rescue and recovery, and we will encourage the faithful in our region to respond generously.

"The Church is also providing human resources on the ground to respond to immediate needs through our aid agencies.

"Be assured of our ongoing prayers and our attention as your people recover from this tragedy."

The huge earthquakes have killed tens of thousands, and destroyed homes, businesses and infrastructure throughout Turkey and Syria. Urgent and ongoing humanitarian aid is needed.

One minute worse than 12 years of war

"Less than one minute was worse than 12 years of war," says a survivor from Syria.

Even though Syria has been at war for almost 12 years, for many people in Aleppo and in other cities that were affected, the devastating earthquake of 6 February was more traumatic.

"If you ask the people of Aleppo about the war they lived through, they express their feelings of pain, fear, despair about the future, loss of safety, etc. They use many different expressions to express the 12-year war.

"But if you ask them about the earthquake that they were exposed to, the answer is just one word: horror", says a Catholic religious sister who lives and works in Aleppo.

Catholic aid

• The main Catholic hospital of St Louis in Aleppo withstood the quakes and has been helping survivors.
• Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) says it will be providing at least half a million Euros of immediate aid to Christians in Syria.
• Among the Catholic organisations working on the ground in Syria providing relief are Franciscans in Lattakia, the Armenian Orthodox in Aleppo, the Institute of the Incarnate Word and the St Vincent de Paul Society.
• Many Catholic churches are providing shelter for the homeless.
• The Syrian Synod of Catholic bishops has assembled a team of engineers to assess and price the damage to Christian families' houses. ACN says it hopes to be able to help with this.

Source

• Catholic Weekly
• ACN International
• ACN International

A Mass of Dedication was celebrated last Sunday afternoon at St Mary of the Angel's church in Wellington.

The central Wellington church was almost at its 550-person capacity for the Mass.

The Dedication Mass was the finale of a year of celebration.

Exactly a year earlier, St Mary of the Angels celebrated rededicating the country to Mary. A specially commissioned artwork, Ko Hata Maria, te Matua Wahine o te Atua - Holy Mary, Mother of God was unveiled at that time.

The artwork was then taken on a year-long hikoi (journey) around the country's six dioceses.

It was carried back into St Mary of the Angels at the start of Sunday's Dedication Mass. It will now be on permanent view as part of the national shrine.

In his homily, Cardinal John Dew noted sacred sites are found in many places around the world. In Wellington, these include the tomb of the Venerable Suzanne Aubert and a memorial to the Wahine disaster.

"Sacred sites all over the world are visited by thousands… they may be natural sites or designed and built by human beings. These places often hold deep meaningful messages, are awe-inspiring, they prompt us to reflect on life, on where we are with God, stir up feelings of awe and reverence and draw us close to God.

"St Mary of the Angels is already a sacred place and has been for 100 years. Now this Icon of Mary Mother of God Assumed into Heaven is here permanently… we hope and pray that in time this becomes one of those sacred sites."

Aotearoa New Zealand's first Catholic Bishop, Jean-Baptiste Pompallier, dedicated the country to Mary Assumed into Heaven when he celebrated the country's first Mass at Totara Point in the Hokianga in January 1838.

A video of the full service is available here.

Source

• NZ Catholic Bishops Conference

The awards are named in honour of Cardinal Reginald Delargey (1914-79) who was noted for his tireless work for young Catholics.

The awards are presented by the New Zealand Catholic Bishops Conference every two years to recognise outstanding involvement in Catholic youth ministry.

The winners for 2022

• Both Janette Bradbrook and Mike Fidow come from the Catholic Parish of Christchurch East. They won the Catechesis category, for their commitment to building the youth ministry in their parish and diocese.
• Peter Fuga is from Our Lady of the Assumption Parish, Onehunga. He won the Advocacy, Catechesis, Community Life, Evangelisation, Leadership Development and Prayer and Worship categories. Fuga was chosen because of "his limitless energy in providing opportunities and inspiration for young people".
• The fourth award winner is Michelle Schaare from the Catholic Parish of New Plymouth. Her Advocacy category award recognises her passion for the employment, support and governance of youth ministers.

Bishop of Auckland Stephen Lowe, Secretary of the NZ Catholic Bishops Conference-Te Huinga o nga Pihopa Katorika o Aotearoa spoke about why the winners were chosen.

In each case their nomination letters spoke of their deep investment, leadership, faith and remarkable contributions to the young people of the Church in Aotearoa New Zealand, he said.

The Delargey Awards have been presented since 2004.

Besides recognising long-term involvement in Catholic ministry with young people, they also recognise the winners' efforts to raise the ministry's profile.

Source

• New Zealand Catholic Bishops' Conference

The Government announced on Wednesday a 200-person limit for those with a vaccine pass at a religious gathering such as Mass, says a statement from the bishop's conference.

"It is really welcome that these restrictions are being eased in the middle of Lent and with Easter just over three weeks away," the statement says.

Bishop Stephen Lowe says while the bishops supported vaccine passes and similar restrictions when they were introduced last November, their support was based on the pandemic emergency as it was at the time.

He warns that loosening the restrictions doesn't mean this is "life as normal. We know that the virus will continue to have an impact on the way we celebrate in our churches for a while yet," he says.

People gathering inside at a church setting will still need to remain cautious and we will need to avoid certain ways of celebrating rituals that might make it easier for infections to spread, says Lowe.

Managing your own safety

Responding to the restriction easing, Epidemiologist Professor Michael Baker advises people to reconsider now Covid restrictions are beginning to ease.

"If you don't have underlying illnesses and you're not particularly elderly, you can still go out and enjoy life - just try and do it safely."

That means wearing the right kind of mask in the right setting. He recommends wearing a respirator mask like the N95.

Elderly or immuno-compromised people - even those who are vaccinated - have fewer choices, he says.

"The only thing you can do in that situation is to actually reduce your contacts quite significantly."

It is a point reinforced by the chair of the government's Strategic Covid-19 Public Health Advisory Group, Professor Sir David Skegg.

Skegg told the NZ Herald that for this and subsequent outbreaks, people are being asked to consider their own behaviour and appetite for risk.

In Australia, with Covid-19 cases soaring, Prime Minister, Scott Morrison is spending up large, tipping in almost A$2bn to clinch a deal with Moderna to produce 100 million mRNA jabs under a 10-year plan to pandemic-proof the nation.

With 62,000 new infections on Wednesday, the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation met to finalise approval for a fourth jab ahead of winter.

Source:

• Catholic.org.nz
• NZ Herald
• The Australian
• Image: New Zealand Catholic Bishops Conference

The big vision for the new lay ministry is that it aims to encourage greater participation of lay people in the teaching of the Catholic faith, and not just in places where priests are in short supply.

So far, the details are a little hazy.

Francis says the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments will publish "in the near future" a liturgical rite for the ministry, to be adopted by bishops "in accordance with their own local traditions."

It will then be up to the national conferences of bishops to decide "the necessary process of formation and the normative criteria for admission to this ministry," the pope says.

An informal canvas of opinion among some involved New Zealand Catholics about the new ministry found much interest, many questions and a number of suppositions rather than answers.

Given Catechists will teach and preach the faith, questions revolved around the training of the new ministers.

• How formal will the training be?
• What level of training will there be?
• Who will supply the training?
• Will the training be nationally based or at a diocesan level?
• Given the kind of information catechists impart, will their training involve going to residential courses at the Catholic Theological College?
• Who will be responsible for the catechists?
• What post-study supervision will they receive?
• Will the new ministry apply only to parish work or will it apply to schools too?
• Will RE Teachers who are already teaching the RE curriculum automatically qualify?
• Is there a vision for how the new ministry will work?
• How does it link to the lay pastoral workers (some pictured) who already work in some dioceses?
• Will the position be paid?

According to all the information to date, the pope has left all these and other locally-focused questions to each country's own bishops' conference to provide locally-developed solutions.

The New Zealand Catholic Bishops Conference was contacted for comment.

Source

• Religion News Service
• US News
• Catholic News Service

The Tablet reports the bishops' conferences are considering using the Revised New Jerusalem Bible (RNJB) published last year in the new lectionary.

The RNJB Foreword says: "attention has been given to rendering the language and imagery of the original languages accurately rather than by dynamic equivalence."

Inclusive language

According to The Tablet, however, the bishops' decision - made without meaningful consultation with scholars, clergy or faithful - to choose a literal translation that lacks inclusive language has sparked fury.

Overnight, Professor Thomas O'Loughlin told CathNews that inclusive language is a must.

"Anything that alienates someone such that they experience a sense of exclusion from the liturgy has no place there or we are arrogating to ourselves a right of judgement that belongs to God alone".

"This is not simply a matter of adding ‘and sisters' when the Greek text has but adelphoi - as the NRSV has done - but of making sure that there are no texts used which are so rooted in a patriarchal culture that many women today sense exclusion", he wrote.

Multiple translations

O'Loughlin takes further the selection of a suitable translation, asking if just one translation is necessary or indeed optimal.

When considering a lectionary O'Loughlin says focussing on a literal translation is a distraction.

He says the purpose behind a lectionary is for proclamation and suggests that fundamental to any choice of text is how comprehensible it is when read aloud.

He also suggests we need different translations for different settings, for example for use with children's liturgies.

O'Loughlin is Professor Emeritus of Historical Theology
The University of Nottingham and currently serves as a director of both Studia Traditionis Theologiae and Brepols Library of Christian Sources.

His full piece will feature in Friday's edition of CathNews.

Controversy contines

The Tablet says the lectionary project's history, began in 2006, when Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor intimated that it was time to begin the process of producing a new one.

The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) was the first alternative considered but finally in 2016 the bishops of England and Wales decided the new lectionary would use the more literal translation of the English Standard Version Catholic Edition (ESV-CE).

Much controversy followed.

The Tablet says one issue that has incensed the bishops' critics is that the ESV "seen as Calvinist in its translation philosophy" was produced in the US by conservative evangelical scholars.

Another issue critics are concerned about is that the ESV - ‘essentially literal' translation "seeks as far as possible to capture the precise wording of the original text and the personal style of each biblical writer."

The Revised Standard Version (RSV) and its replacement, the NRSV, also aim for word-for-word accuracy, though the NRSV is a little looser than the ESV.

The Jerusalem Bible, on the other hand, favours "functional equivalence": in other words, it is a translation that seeks to express the meaning of the ancient texts in modern terminology.

What makes a "functional translation" unfit for use in the liturgy is that it nullifies the theologies inherent in the ancient texts, the Tablet says.

It explains that functional or dynamic translation is "theo­logically lazy and catechetically irresponsible."

It demands nothing of pastors and parishioners by way of grappling with God's holy words, says The Tablet.

It destroys the biblical injunction of all the prophets to visit the past to understand the pain of the present and thereby to be empowered to create a new future.

The Tablet also points out that 21st century English has a far bigger vocabulary than was available in the standard dictionary of ancient Hebrew.

Where ancient Hebrew contains around 8,000 words, present day English has a far greater word choice available.

Finally, much has been made of the ­decision of the ESV translators not to use ­gender-neutral language.

Most modern translations use the inclusive "brothers and sisters"; the ESV - true to its "word-for-word" principle - translates it directly as "brothers", but in a footnote explains: "Or brothers and sisters.

In New Testament usage, depending on the context, the plural Greek word adelphoi (translated "brothers") may refer either to brothers or to brothers and ­sisters."

We will always have arguments about translations and meanings, The Tablet concludes.

Source

• The Tablet
• Image: Rorate Caeli

Auckland Bishop Patrick Dunn stepped down from the role at the end of his three-year term and because of health reasons.

Hamilton Bishop Stephen Lowe was also appointed vice-president and secretary of the conference.

Auckland Auxiliary Bishop Michael Gielen was given responsibility for Youth and Young People and the Bilateral Dialogue with the Anglicans. Read more

The comment came in a statement from Catholic Bishops and religious leaders on the morning of the first day of the Royal Commission into abuse in faith-based care.

"The bishops and congregational leaders asked to be included in the work of the Royal Commission," says Cardinal John Dew.

"They are committed to working with it, for events of the past to be examined transparently and openly, and to implement the Commission's eventual recommendations. We acknowledge the harm caused to many and express our profound sorrow."

Sister Margaret Anne Mills, president of the religious Congregational Leaders' Conference of Aotearoa New Zealand (CLCANZ), praised the courage of abuse survivors who have come forward to share their experiences.

CLCANZ represents 43 Catholic religious entities on Te Ropu Tautoko, a Catholic Church agency formed to co-ordinate and manage cooperation between the Royal Commission and the Catholic Church.

"We will be listening very carefully to what survivors have to say, reflecting on their evidence and learning from their experiences," Mills says.

The Royal Commission's first faith-based redress hearings began yesterday.

Last week an application supported by the Anglican Church and Salvation Army, the Catholic Church sought non-publication orders about the accused.

The Church says the application was made because there had not been enough time to contact those who would be named, or the families of the deceased.

It also raised concerns of natural justice for those deceased.

At a procedural hearing on that and other applications, which included those accused of abuse and those helping to cover it up, lawyer Sally McKechnie told chair Judge Coral Shaw the church was not seeking to hide evidence.

"It is purely a question of whether the name is publicly used now," she says.

Some of the people would be named publicly for the first time, McKechnie says.

The delay would give their families more time to process the accusations.

In a decision released Thursday, Shaw declined all but one of the Church's applications.

Dr Murray Heasley, spokesman for the Network of Survivors of Abuse in Faith-based Institutions and their Supporters, told the NZ Herald they were pleased with the outcome.

The Royal Commission's faith-based redress hearings will hear evidence first of all from abuse survivors who were in care of the Catholic Church, Anglican Church and the Salvation Army.

The Royal Commission says these hearings "will investigate the adequacy of the redress processes of the Catholic Church, Anglican Church and the Salvation Army and what needs to be done to support people who have been abused or neglected in faith-based institutions."

However, these hearings "will not examine the merits of any individual claims, nor resolve disputed factual issues relating to those claims."

Source

• New Zealand Catholic Bishops' Conference
• NZ Herald
• Image: TVNZ

NZMA says it goes against medical values and is a "step too far" for many doctors.

NZMA chair Kate Baddock says while the association opposes the concept of euthanasia, it would work through the details of the Act before it came into effect next year.

She says the majority of medical professionals are against assisted dying.

"The main concerns for doctors is that it alters the fundamental relationship with the patient.

"There is going to be lots of implications which need to be worked through in some detail."

Coercion is an issue NZMZ says it must be "particularly careful about coercion. It could be so subtle no one picks it up."

Over 1800 doctors signed an open letter opposing assisted dying, entitled "Doctors say No", stating that assisted dying is unethical, regardless of whether it is legalised.

NZMA says the outcome has created a "complex" situation for medical professionals, particularly in rural areas with few GPs.

Doctors will work within the legal framework and just as they can with abortion, will be able to conscientiously object to taking part in ending lives.

Bioethics expert for the Catholic bishops, Dr John Kleinsman (pictured), says it puts vulnerable people and those who care for them on an unwelcome and dangerous path.

Kleinsman says the Act will bring a new and unwelcome dynamic into many people's lives.

"The very presence of the option of euthanasia will present as a burden and a pressure for many people and families," says Kleinsman.

Those who work with the dying will also be affected, he says.

These include doctors, nurses and other health carers, as well as chaplains, priests and lay ministers.

"We will be reflecting in the coming months with these groups as to how the law will impact the people they care for, as well as the carers themselves. Among the questions raised will be ones about the provision of the sacraments at the end of life, and the impact on funeral celebrations."

Friday's preliminary results saw 65.2 percent of votes cast in favour of the End of Life Choice Act, with 33.8 percent against.

Assisted dying is defined in the End of Life Choice Act as a doctor or nurse practitioner giving a person medication to relieve their suffering by bringing on death, or, the taking of medication by a person to relieve their suffering by bringing on death.

Those opting for an assisted death have to be 18 or older and suffering a terminal illness likely to end their life within six months.

The official results will be released this Friday.

Source

• NZ Catholic Bishops' Conference
• Stuff
• Image: Stuff