Homilies

The 19th century Scottish author, George Macdonald, was something of a renaissance man. A minister, Christian apologist, poet, and pioneer in fantasy fiction, he was a major influence

Vanity of vanities, the Preacher says, all is vanity! (Eccles 1:2; 2:21-3) In so many ways, ours is an age of self-absorption, even self-obsession. More than 80 million photographs are uploaded to Instagram every day, mostly people’s selfies

The summer of 1221 was a hot one. Global warming meant Europe was one and a half degrees warmer than usual, and was experiencing strange weather, melting glaciers, wheat growing all the way to Scandinavia, grapes all over England.

“Lord, teach us to pray.” (Lk 11:1-13;Mt 6:8-13) OK, Jesus says, here’s a catechism of prayer for you. Let me teach you prayer of adoration, prayer of petition, prayer of contrition, and prayer of thanksgiving.

Fifty years ago yesterday, on July 20 1969, I was nine years old and along with my class of excited fourth-graders at St Michael’s Lane Cove – and 20% of the world’s population

Three great and related ideas inspire and compete for the soul today: Christianity, Islam, and Secularism. Christianity, that is, faith in the person and Gospel of Jesus Christ,

What are they staring at? In Paul Newton’s painting of The Catholic Community in Sydney c. 1818 the youngest are the most intensely focused on what they would have called ‘the Blessed Sacrament’.

Today we bless a new work of sacred art, The Mother of Divine Wisdom with St Joseph and St Mary of the Cross MacKillop, created by Chiara Perinetti Casoni, whom we welcome today to Australia and celebrate in the University.

Trials and errors, courts and appeals have been very much in the air of late! In our two readings this morning both Peter and Paul are on trial, and their further trials are prophesied. Paul had been imprisoned by the Governor of Judea, Antonius Felix,

In the 1987 humorous detective novel, Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, the eponymous detective declares that “if it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, we have at least to consider the possibility