Faith Journey

As a mum of four children, I have sat through many graduation speeches. Some have been inspiring and memorable and others have been cringeworthy. As we draw close to the end of the year, some of you will be listening – maybe even in person, if COVID-19 restrictions permit – to farewell speeches as your young ones finish primary or secondary school, or even university.

Our Faith Journey article takes a different tack this month. Normally, we don’t focus on explicit activities in the Catholic Church in Australia, but we thought recent events were worthy of mention.

Have you ever heard Nick Cave’s song, “Into my arms”? Its opening lines intrigue me every time I hear them...

In a recent edition of The Weekend Australian Magazine, Greg Sheridan wrote about three well-known people who profess faith in Jesus Christ. Scott Morrison became a Christian at the age of 12, Peter Cosgrove has been a Catholic all his life and Bill Hayden “was a conscientious and intellectually serious atheist” until he decided to embrace Catholicism in 2018.  

The way my four adult children deal with what life throws at them is intriguing.

One of them tends to share her emotions with the entire world. Well, maybe that is a slight exaggeration, but if she is angry or “ticked off”, or excited and joyful, we all know! The others often require a bit of prodding to prise out of them what is percolating inside.

In the middle of the COVID-19 lockdown of 2020, my mother-in-law announced over the phone that one of the hardest things about losing her husband of 67 years was not having him to pray with. Her daily routine of praying alongside her beloved husband, as well as not being able to physically go to Mass, was adding to the great sadness that his death had brought.

“No man (or woman) is an island.” So go the opening lines of the 400-year-old poem by John Donne. It is a phrase often used to express the idea that humans do better when they live in community rather than in isolation.

Have you ever felt invisible? I don’t mean invisible in that magical Harry Potter “cloak of invisibility” type of invisible! I mean invisible in the sense that you have been forgotten, ignored, dismissed, overlooked.

The thought of someone feeling like they are invisible to the world around them has been on my mind lately. I had been listening to a podcast where the guest was a veteran journalist and Mexican immigrant to the United States.

The Australian calendar is dotted with public holidays. I happen to live in the nation’s capital, and it was noted to me on “Canberra Day” that Canberrans have more public holidays than any other state or territory in Australia. Hmmm. I wasn’t sure if that was true, so all I could respond with is: “Aren’t we lucky!”

When Eddie McGuire resigned recently as president of the Collingwood Football Club, there was a great deal of commentary about the timing of his apology. Eddie McGuire did lots of great things for Collingwood, and for football in general. But when the findings of racism within the club were announced, why was his apology so slow in coming?