Opinion

I once lived in a church, a red brick one, which disturbed the neat symmetry of the terrace houses lining a square in a genteel part of Islington in London. Converted in the 1980s to apartments, it had high ceilings, arched windows and metre-thick walls. I’ve never slept so soundly. More recently, I lived in an 1870s house in Fitzroy, ...

CHRISTIANS have pretty broad shoulders. Well, we need them really, when you consider all the bad stuff that keeps popping up about sexual abuse and homophobia and fundamentalists. In most public arenas, Christians accept the chastisement and even vitriol heaped upon us for the alleged sins of our forbears and the outrageous behaviour of anyone anywhere purporting to be a ...

Dallas Brooks Centre, Melbourne 26 September 2012 IT is a particular pleasure to be part of these centenary celebrations. I grew up knowing about the work of the Australian Inland Mission (AIM), and its successor Frontier Services, and always had a sense of its importance in national life and in the mission of the church. It was simply part of ...

Cardinal George Pell is the most powerful and influential religious leader in Australia, according to The Power Index, an online news site which purports to measure such things. Alongside Pell are Sydney Anglican Archbishop Peter Jensen and Jim Wallace from the Australian Christian Lobby. Read The Power Index Religion list here: www.thepowerindex.com.au/powerlists/religion/ Are these people really the most influential religious ...

Rev Prof Andrew Dutney, President, Uniting Church in Australia- "Trinity College in the late 1970s made me the Christian I am. Our lecturers taught by example – especially Rollie Busch and Han Spykerboer. They modelled how to reflect theologically on the public issues of the day, and how to act with integrity and courage as disciples of Jesus." Rev Kaye ...

A YOUNG man who attended a Lutheran school was going out with a girl who was educated in a Roman Catholic school. He was amazed to discover that she had never heard of Martin Luther or the Reformation. What do you think should be taught in a church-based school? What do you hope the graduates of our Uniting Church schools ...

TALKING to so many educators for this issue could not help but make me think about how much I am learning myself every day at work on Journey. It made me reflect, too, on how we really do learn in community with others whether in dedicated classrooms or lecture halls, or in the midst of the communities we find in ...

WITH the federal Parliament set to toughen our treatment of asylum seekers, I'm reflecting deeply on the Bible's message about the importance of welcoming strangers. "I was hungry and you gave me food. I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink. I was a stranger and you welcomed me." (Matthew 25:35-36). It's a fundamental theme running through both ...

WHILE waiting by the carousel for luggage after our flight home from Adelaide, with memories of the 13th Assembly swirling in my head, I read a text message from my sister announcing that my aunt had died. Aunty Beth, a maiden aunt, had lived with my parents for most of my life. Hers was a remarkable life. Born in 1920, ...

IT is my great honour to embark on my first issue of Journey – done by way of a joyful plunge into the deep end of the Life Overflowing at the 13th Assembly. In these pages, we bring you many of the inspiring moments and impressive people from that week in Adelaide, and, I hope, a feeling for some of ...