The flood in the Solomon Islands stranded Brother Joris van der Zant, the director San Isidro Care Centre for young people with speech and hearing disabilities. On Sunday the Archbishop Honiara, Adrian Smith reported that Brother Joris had been isolated from the centre, stranded between two damaged bridges. Joris eventually managed to return to the Read more
Severe flooding in the Solomon Islands helped give extra meaning to the 6,000 young people taking part in the Caritas Challenge over the weekend. “We need to be far more grateful for all we have because they have so little and even that is being taken away from them,” said Mareko Ennor, a Year 12 student Read more
Over 6,000 youth will be participating in Caritas Challenge events in New Zealand this week end. The Caritas Challenge is an annual 24-hour event for schools and youth groups during Lent At Garin College in Nelson, for example, over 170 students are spending Saturday night in cardboard boxes on the school’s tennis courts and going Read more
A Solomon Islands opposition party says it will encourage greater involvement of churches in education if it forms the new government following the national elections later this year. The People’s Alliance Party says the involvement of churches in education was reduced in 1970 when they were allowed to administer only secondary schools. Before that churches Read more
The Presbyterian church of Vanuatu and the South Seas Evangelical Church (SSEC) of Solomon Islands has formally agreed for the Solomon Islands Missionaries to serve in Vanuatu. The formal agreement was signed during the celebration of the 50th Golden Jubilee of SSEC in Ambu, Malaita. Following the agreement, SSEC’s Bishop Mathias Lima commissioned 10 Solomon Read more
The Solomon Islands Law Reform Commission (SILRC) conducted a one day sorcery consultation for church leaders around Honiara at the St Barnabas Cathedral last week. The sorcery offence workshop is part of the on-going review of the Penal Code and Criminal Procedure Code. The aim of the consultation was to have church leaders have their Read more
Experienced educationalist Brendan Schollum, a former principal at Sacred Heart College in Auckland and the foundation principal at Aquinas College, Tauranga, is to travel to the Solomons in late September to work with and advise the archdiocese of Honiara’s education office. The education secretary for the archdiocese of Honiara, Cypriano Nuake, was in New Zealand Read more
New Friends and Old Sometime in August our staff Josephine and I attended a Boroko Rotary Club dinner and made a presentation on the work of WeCARe! It went over very well and the club is very interested in helping us. They have already given us a handsome donation which is very welcome, and told Read more
On Friday 28th June 2013 the Catholic Theological Institute (CTI) in Bomana, Port Moresby celebrated its Golden Jubilee. CTI has been the academic wing of Holy Spirit Seminary since 1999 when the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea set up a distinct institute for the academic formation of seminarians and laity. Thus Read more
Pope Francis has named Archbishop Michael W. Banach the apostolic nuncio for Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. Pope Benedict XVI had named Banach, a Vatican diplomat, to be an apostolic nuncio, which carries with it the title of archbishop, in February. He was born the son of Wallace and Jane Banach. He grew up Read more