Queensland Synod News

UnitingCare Australia has welcomed today’s announcement by the Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, Jenny Macklin, that a formal apology to Forgotten Australians will be issued by the end of this year. UnitingCare Australia National Director, Ms Lin Hatfield Dodds, said today, “This announcement by the Minister is a very positive step. The 2004 Forgotten Australians report ...

CADBURY AUSTRALIA an-nounced in late August that they have committed to making over 60% of their milk chocolate range guaranteed fairtrade by Easter next year and available through-out Australia and New Zealand. This announcement means that one of the world’s largest chocolate companies is helping lead the cocoa industry away from child labour; particularly in West Africa where 70% of ...

Rev Olav Fykse Tveit, an ordained pastor in the Church of Norway, has been elected as general secretary of the World Council of Churches. The announcement was made in Geneva on 27 August by the WCC’s main governing body, its central committee. Tveit, born on 24 November 1960, is general secretary of the Church of Norway Council on Ecumenical and ...

A Short film made at Ayr State Primary School has been chosen as a finalist in the Ignite Short Film competition that attracts entries from across Australia and Internationally. The Ignite Short film Competition is a competition for films of 5 minutes or less, that depict various verse of the Bible. The theme for 2009 was verses that contained a ...

Rev Dr Samuel Kobia sounded notes of hope as he delivered his final address as general secretary to the World Council of Churches central committee on 26 August. “I hope it is unnecessary to emphasize that the ‘courage to hope’ has been a central theme of my personal ecumenical journey,” Dr Kobia said. “Holding together cross and resurrection, the sinful ...

Tears were shed in Fiji and Australia after Commodore Frank Bainimarama revoked the promised permit for the Methodist Church in Fiji and Rotuma to hold its annual choir competition on a district level. The permit was the Military Government’s part of a compromise agreement where the Methodist leadership agreed to cancel their annual conference and national choir competition if the ...

In an unprecedented attack on religious freedom in Fiji the Methodist President Rev Ame Tugaue and General Secretary Rev Tuikilakila Waqairatu will be back in court tomorrow (Thursday 13 August) charged with breaching the Public Emergency Regulations imposed by the Military Government. The charges arose after the Methodist Church Standing Committee refused to prohibit two of its ministers from attending ...

Hong Kong, 5 August (ENI) People are turning to spirituality during the credit crunch, say organizers of a recent Honk Kong book fair, where books on religion were among the most popular. "Books on religion and philosophy ranked number four on the visitors’ buying list," Christine Kwok, who managed a visitor survey at the book fair, told journalists at the ...

UnitingCare Australia’s National Director, Lin Hatfield Dodds, presented a speech this week to a national conference on Intergovernmental Relations. Lin was asked to bring a community perspective to best practice policy development. Most of the conference’s participants were senior public servants from federal and state governments, and this event proved to be a very worthwhile opportunity to reflect on our ...

Charles Wesley, the great Methodist hymn writer, may have penned his famous words "O for a thousand tongues to sing my great Redeemer praise" almost 270 years ago, but it seems just singing these words today in strife-torn Fiji could destabilise a whole government. The military government of interim prime minister Commodore Frank Bainimarama has agitated the normally harmonious voice ...