Caritas Australia Communities in Crisis – Asia Pacific Appeal
Call (03) 9926 5786, (03) 9926 5706, 1800 024 813 or donate online at www.caritas.org.au
Mail to: Caritas Australia, 383 Albert Street, East Melbourne, 3002

The Parish Youth Group Meeting

26th July in the O.L.M.C. Multi Purpose Room

The Parish Youth Group got off the ground last Sunday night after the 5.30pm Mass. The first get-together was held at Our Lady of Mount Carmel School multipurpose room with 20 plus young people and several volunteer organisers. Pizzas were provided by the Sunbury Branch of the Knights of the Southern Cross and went a long way towards helping to break the ice of the first night.

PEOPLE OF FAITH IN A SECULAR SOCIETY

What is a secular society? What does it mean for you, as a person of faith, to live, work and contribute to society— a society and community that is indifferent or hostile to faith? Is a secular society the best place for a religious person to be? Talk some of these issues through with other people of faith in the beautiful environment of the Yarra Valley at a 4-day live-in conference from 6—9 July.

More info—www.jcma.org.au

Join other people around the Archdiocese and celebrate the one-year anniversary of World Youth Day 2008 this July. Catch up with fellow pilgrims and enjoy a special performance by international musician Matt Maher on 5 July, Catechesis in the Cathedral with Fr Chris Ryan MGL on 19 July and an Evening of Prayer at St Francis with Bishop Prowse on 22 July.
For more info, contact the Archdiocesan Office for Youth on 9412 8408 or visit www.aoy.org.au

 Last July the youth of the world came to Australia. Now it’s time to share your gifts with the world. Palms Australia is interested in meeting teachers, doctors, nurses and other professional, technical and trades people willing to share their skills for 1-3 years in Asia, Africa or the Pacific.
Come to a Palms Focus Workshop at St Francis Church Pastoral Centre, Lonsdale St. Melbourne on SAT 27 JUNE at 9.30am.
RSVP: Benjamin (02) 9518 9551 fax: (02) 9518
9550, email: ben@palms.org.au Website: www.palms.org.au

The World’s Largest Humanitarian Organisation
-bringing hope to millions!-
In Australia, through 1,700 schools, more than 80 hospitals, more than 30,000 aged care beds and at home services, St Vincent de Paul, Centacare (now CatholicCare in some dioceses) and the myriad of outreach provided by religious orders, parishes and dioceses, the work of the Catholic Church is perhaps 50 times that of the Red Cross in Australia and around 40% of all the charitable work of non-profit organisations nationally.

Internationally, the Catholic Church is the largest or close to largest provider of humanitarian services in the Pacific, sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America. It is a major provider in Asian countries such as India, Sri Lanka and Hong Kong, even though the Catholic population is relatively small. Hundreds of millions of people rely on the Catholic Church every day for a wide range of services including primary, secondary and tertiary education, basic health services, clinics and hospitals, orphanages, welfare support, pastoral care and family support, job creation, advocacy against injustice and so much more. Continue reading “The World’s Largest Humanitarian Organisation”

World Youth Day has gone and some of us feel empty. What has the Spirit called us to do? What about those of us who didn’t go to Sydney but sat glued to the television set throughout it all? Doing nothing isn’t an option. We don’t want it to be just how it was. We want to change things. We want to make a better world.
As Archbishop Oscar Romero said, “Aspire not to have more, but to be more“
Start by looking at the Caritas BeMore website http://www.bemore.org.au and get everyone signed up for the Be More newsletter.

Form a big group, a small group, several groups. Small groups could come from bigger groups just to focus on one aspect of action.

Remember
We plant the seeds that one day will grow. We water the seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise. We lay foundations that will need further development. We provide yeast that produces effects far beyond our capabilities.

We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing this.
This enables us to do something, and to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an opportunity for the Lord’s grace to enter and do the rest.
We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker. We are workers, not master builders, ministers, not messiahs. We are prophets of a future not our own.

– Archbishop Oscar Romero (martyred on March 24th 1980)