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Keywords: Father Frank Brennan

  • RELIGION

    St Patrick's Day talk

    • Frank Brennan
    • 17 March 2012

    Text is from Fr Frank Brennan SJ's St Patrick's Day Celebration talk at the Australian Centre for Christianity and Culture, 17 March 2012.

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  • RELIGION

    Morris affair contains lessons for Church hierarchy

    • Frank Brennan
    • 25 January 2012
    57 Comments

    Just because there is no legal remedy to the denial of natural justice to former bishop Bill Morris, that is no reason for the senior hierarchy not to reflect acutely on their treatment of him. Respectful dialogue with Toowoomba's church leaders would be a good start. 

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  • RELIGION

    The Pope in Alice: 25 years on

    • Frank Brennan
    • 29 November 2011
    19 Comments

    Protocol dictated that he could not wear Aboriginal colours. But local custom won out when he donned a black, red and yellow stole given to him on the track. His speech put strong challenges to the Church, but offered too optimistic a reading of the prospects of Aboriginal Australians taking their rightful place in it.

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  • RELIGION

    Homily for John Eddy

    • Frank Brennan
    • 11 November 2011
    5 Comments

    Asked 'How are you?', John would caress his scalp, straighten his hat, adjust his cuffs, massage his moustache, purse his lips, and answer, 'I'm headed for Grand Central. But I don't know when this service is due to arrive.' He never did meet Stalin, but thought he had met just about everyone else of significance on the planet.

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  • RELIGION

    Aussie priest's theology of the scrub

    • Frank Brennan
    • 09 November 2011
    10 Comments

    I had time to spare, so I grabbed a bite to eat and found a bench in the park opposite the cathedral. I was approached by four young Aboriginal people. I told them I'd come for a funeral: 'You might have known him, Father Mick Hayes?' 'He, that tall grey one? He knew me when I was a little fella.'

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  • RELIGION

    What difference does it make now that Mary MacKillop is a saint?

    • Frank Brennan
    • 14 October 2011

    Mary visited Rome as a young religious woman when she was being persecuted by local bishops for being too independent. She got a good hearing from the Pope and great assistance from Fr Anderledy who became the Superior General of the Jesuits. If only Bishop Bill Morris could have received the same sympathetic hearing.

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  • RELIGION

    Making friends not foes of rights and religion

    • Frank Brennan
    • 13 September 2011
    5 Comments

    The Church of the 21st century should be the exemplar of due process, natural justice and transparency. While there can be little useful critique of the final decision of Pope Benedict to force the early retirement of Bishop Bill Morris, there is plenty of scope to review the processes leading up to it.

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  • RELIGION

    Faith and famine: The new Irish who call Australia home

    • Frank Brennan
    • 30 August 2011
    3 Comments

    The faith of the Irish in politics, economics and religion is at a low ebb, and for the most understandable of reasons.  It is not a famine, but it is mighty grim. There are tens of thousands coming here under the  457 visa and the Irish Working Holiday Visa.

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  • RELIGION

    Religious groups and the Bill of Rights debate

    • Frank Brennan
    • 18 July 2011

    Speech given by Fr Frank Brennan SJ at the 'Law and Religion: Legal Regulation of Religious Groups, Organisations and Communities' Conference Dinner in Melbourne on 15 July 2011.

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  • RELIGION

    Human rights and Christian lawyers

    • Frank Brennan
    • 18 July 2011
    5 Comments

    When I appeared on Q&A with Christopher Hitchens, a young man asked whether we can 'ever hope to live in a truly secular society' while the religious continue to 'affect political discourse and decision making' on euthanasia, same-sex unions and abortion. Hitchens was simpaticao. I was dumbstruck.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    My morning with Frank Brennan

    • Brian Doyle
    • 22 June 2011
    12 Comments

    Fell into riveting conversation recently. We talked about Australia's and Oregon's history with assisted suicide, the plight of Indigenous Australians, and his views on the personal and public profiles of Cardinal George Pell. Here's how it happened.

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  • RELIGION

    Indonesian and Australian justice

    • Frank Brennan
    • 01 June 2011
    5 Comments

    At a gallery opening in Bali, the Australia-Indonesia relationship was compared to a rope with many strands, with art and culture the most resilient. In the audience were Australian lawyers who have supported members of the Bali Nine, and lawyers acting for Indonesian minors still held in long term detention in Australia without charge.

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