Stefan Gigacz. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen the pope as relaxed as he was during his audience with Cardinal Cardijn and the JOC (Young Christian Workers or YCW),” wrote Belgian Bishop André-Marie Charue following the ceremony at which the YCW founder received his red hat in February 1965. It was the climax of a […]
Peter Whiting. Doubtless, it displays something of my vintage, when I find myself citing words written by that great economist John Maynard Keynes in 1933, reflecting on the road to recovery after the Great Depression. He wrote, “It is not an engineering problem or an agricultural problem. It is not even a business problem … […]
Bruce Duncan. The Vatican has launched a stringent critique of widespread abuses in global economies, which are driving astonishing degrees of inequality, threatening ecological sustainability, and unleashing powerful reactionary political forces in response, as seen in parts of Europe and elsewhere. The issues are keenly pertinent in Australia, as we see in the Australian Royal […]
Joseph A Camilleri. Australia’s handling of its relations with China is rapidly descending into farce. Geoff Raby’s excellent piece in Pearls and Irritations (30 April) makes abundantly clear the principal factor at work, namely a nostalgic attachment to the US-led regional and global order of earlier years. This is the mindset that drives our security […]
Tim Costello. The Coalition Government’s fifth budget last week was carefully calibrated to offer just enough to a discontented electorate to restart the political contest ahead of the poll expected early next year. Yet again Australia’s battered aid program took a hit, this time in the form of a multi-year cut, combined with an extended […]
Jason Davies-Kildea (Captain). While the 2018 Federal Budget contains some positive initiatives, it fails to deliver on one of the biggest drivers of poverty and disadvantage in the country – the cost of housing. Every day, organisations like The Salvation Army see thousands of Australians struggling to keep up with everyday living expenses. A recent […]
Peter Whiting. You would be forgiven for expecting that the heading of this article refers to the emergence of ‘fake news’ into our lives, primarily through the impact of social media. Certainly, a quick look at recent events leaves us wondering what we know for sure. Sophie Mirabella, in her defamation case against a newspaper, […]
Bruce Duncan. Aid, church, and community groups have been aghast at Prime Minister Turnbull’s announcement in February to spend $3.8 billion to expand arms production seven-fold in order to make Australia one of the top ten global arms suppliers, up from number 20 on the present table of arms producers. He argued that this will […]
Bruce Duncan. Pope Francis has issued strong backing to calls to ban nuclear weapons entirely, including as a deterrent. On a flight back to Rome from Bangladesh on 2 December 2017, he declared, “Today we are at the limit”, because the dangers from nuclear arsenals were now so severe that they risked destroying “the great […]
Andrew Glikson. “The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save human way of thinking and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophes.” Albert Einstein, 1946. Daniel Ellsberg, former presidential advisor, who had released the famous top-secret Pentagon Papers related to the VietNam war, also possessed a cache of top secret documents related to America’s […]
