Dear 'kiwicatholics', Noeline Sapwell, the faithful maintainer of the 'kiwicatholic' prayer ministry, wrote: >This week I am asking you all >to please say a prayer for me :) >I will be making my Secular >Carmelite profession at a Mass this Sunday at >2.00p.m. >I would really appreciate your prayers. You shall have them Noeline! May God bless your pilgrimage of faith under the banner of Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross. Three stories from this weekend's 'NZ Catholic' newspaper on the bishops' Web site at: http://www.catholic.org/newzealand/cathcom/press/nzc/front/html **************************** 'Nelson is site for new college' A new Catholic co-educational college is to break new ground - it will be the only Catholic college in the South Island part of Wellington archdiocese. On October 14 Cardinal Thomas Williams and the mayor of the Tasman District Council, John Hurley, formally signed a sale and purchase agreement for land for the new college ... [U.S. readers: a "college" is a high school] 'Poor housing highlighted in new report' Wellington - The Government's housing policies have led to more than 115,000 people, including 50,000 children, living in crowded conditions, says a report by the New Zealand Council of Christian Social Services ... [Link to the Ministry of Housing's home page where you won't find the CCSS report.] 'Newcomers given warm welcome in Hastings parish' Some applied innovation and creativity have made sure that visitors and new parishioners always feel welcome at Sacred Heart parish in Hastings. The parish has a "New Parishioners" stand in the lobby of the church, staffed every Sunday by parishioner Angela Minton (right) ... ************************** Now at this point, due to a technical hiccup, on looking right you *might* see a picture of Brother Richard Dunleavy, the new secretary general of the Marist Brothers, whose picture appeared in the previous issue. Click your browser's 'Refresh' or 'Reload' button to get the true picture. I am on to this glitch now and will take steps in future to ensure that only the latest photos appear with the latest stories. Oh, and Brother Dunleavy wishes it to be known that he is not now - nor has he ever been - Angela Minton. The reason there's no link to the text of the CCSS housing report is that no Web site has a copy of it. I spoke to the Council's Secretary about this and explained the advantages of publishing on the Web: there's nothing more to do after putting it up, but anyone interested can read, print out and photocopy the report in unlimited quantities, so there's never a shortage and you get a very wide audience. Alas, the Council hasn't the staff to maintain a Web site and apparently couldn't find an existing one to put the report on. Our eldest son Michael (25) wrote this week about his experiences as assistant manager at the Wellington Men's Night Shelter. Mike jnr is also the manager of the Wellington City Mission foodbank and a budget adviser there. Pauline has already responded to his post. He stays at the Night Shelter from Saturday evening to Tuesday evening so his next opportunity to respond will be Wednesday evening. The topic of schools came up during the week. It happens that this weekends' 'NZ Catholic' newspaper also has two items from the Hamilton diocesan Catholic schools' conference: one by the Treasurer, Bill English and the other by the chief review officer of the Education Review Office (the government's school performance watchdog) Dr Judith Aitkin. Bill and Mary English's children attend Sacred Heart convent school in Wellington. He writes that "when people go to a Catholic school they believe the teachers [there] should believe in God ... I know there are teachers who pray with the children but who don't believe in God - my children have had that experience and it confuses them". What is the legal position regarding religious belief and the employment of teachers in the Catholic school system? I know from the advertisements for staff that applicants "must be willing to take a full part in" all aspects of school life. But is it legal to refuse employment on the grounds that someone doesn't believe in God? What if they said they did, and later "I've thought about and now I don't!" In the other item Dr Aitkin writes about a young girl whose mother is " single, a Catholic by baptism, alcoholic by profession .... It is her integrated Roman Catholic school .. that has keep her father and her aunts and uncles and grandmothers in touch with her, paid her bus fare, given her lunch, not minded about her unofficial uniform, fostered her intelligence." A few lines below there's a copy of a letter in this weekend's 'NZ Catholic'. Every best wish and all God's blessings. Mike Leon 'kiwicatholic' list manager ***************************** Women I am writing in the hope that through your paper I might be able to make contact with individual women and groups of women who are already - or who would like to - form a Catholic women's network. I believe that it is time for Catholic women in New Zealand to be united in bringing attention to the need for women to have an environment in the Church which gives them the ability to explore their spirituality as women. We also need to influence the Church to form structures that will give just recognition to the leadership roles of women within the Church and to the way in which women experience leadership. The aims of such a group would be mainly to share resources that feed and nourish women; to promote education for women in theology, Scripture and Church teaching; and to promote the formation of structures that will recognise and foster the use of the special gifts and talents of women in leadership roles within the Catholic Church and society. I am aware of groups of women which are already doing this but believe it is time for women to call for change in the Church with one united voice. Too many women have left the Church because they have no place within it. I believe we are called as women to effect change for future generations. Teresa Homan, 10 Garnet Grove, Upper Hutt.