ON SUNDAY 28 August Brisbane North Region Guides ran their annual service and parade, this year at Wavell Heights Uniting Church with Pastor Terry Stanyer in attendance. Mr Stanyer said it was a wonderful afternoon. “I felt the community spirit with the girls, their families and friends … displaying how the Church outreaches to all the community,” he said. The ...

TEAR AND Scripture Union have joined forces to create the Disciples Without Borders camp to be held from 12 to 16 December on Stradbroke Island. Social justice advocates and camp directors, Lauren Ash and Christel Palmer, said the camp is about meeting Indigenous people, hearing their stories and learning about issues in the community that relate to them. This is ...

AUSTRALIAN CHURCHES Gambling Taskforce Chair, Rev Tim Costello said he has no doubt the Government will continue its poker machine reforms, despite the changes made in the House of Representatives today. Speaking shortly after Liberal Party member Peter Slipper replaced the ALP’s Harry Jenkins as Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rev Costello said both Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Minister ...

As our thoughts turn to Christmas, we reflect on the importance of family and community in our lives. At UnitingCare Australia we are also putting a spotlight on the harm to families and communities that is caused by poker machine addiction. We encourage to you to find out more about this important debate by visiting our website www.unitingforchange.org.au. Australians spent ...

UNITING CHURCH young adults aged 18 to 30, grappled with life’s big questions during a weekend of exploring faith, life and theology for young adults in September. The camp, entitled Consume: Sex, Money, Power … God?, was held in Maleny on 9-11 September. Organised through Trinity Theological College, it is a Moderator’s Initiative. Part of the ongoing Stretching Faith events, ...

A SPECTACULAR display from Townsville’s Shalom Christian College students sent the crowd wild at the 19th Laura Aboriginal Dance Festival in late June. The comic ‘Chooky’ dance broke from the largely traditional performances at the three-day, biennial event attended by around 5000 people. Dressed in funky outfits the students performed their own version of the contemporary Indigenous dance. The ‘Chooky’ ...

THE MOST insidious aspect of prolonged conflict is the total destruction of the lives of survivors. Once the bullets stop ringing and the staccato of missiles is silenced, the survivors have to try to rebuild their lives from the rubble. Teachers who once dreamt of mentoring future leaders have no classrooms in which to impart knowledge; doctors do not have ...

The President of the Uniting Church in Australia, Rev Alistair Macrae, today expressed disappointment at the rugby league clubs’ opposition to the introduction of mandatory pre-commitment measures for poker machines. “I am a lifetime supporter of football clubs. But their claim that this measure will bankrupt them reveals either a very flawed business model or a lack of concern for ...

WE, IN THE Western World, live in a time and space that has been moulded by the concept of modernity and a scientific world view. But do we realise when we read Scripture that the places we have come from – our cultural heritage, church tradition, the understanding of the world that we have been schooled in, our family etc ...

Australian Churches Gambling Taskforce Chair, Rev Tim Costello said Clubs Australia continues its campaign of deception and misinformation, this time misquoting Norwegian research, in an attempt to mislead the public on measures that will limit the impact of poker machine addiction. Rev Costello said the Norsk Tipping report at the heart of today’s Daily Telegraph story actually says that between ...