Letters

from: Margaret Clausen, 18 Nov

Bishop Manning was correct to write that casualisation is creeping into the white collar workforce. Much of the media and union representations assume that most who are casualised are unskilled or semi-skilled.

Those who are lecturing in the tertiary education sector are also, increasingly able to access only casual teaching positions. It is estimated that 25% of teaching at the tertiary level in Australia is being delivered by sessionals. The recent election campaign suggests that nothing in this regard will change over the next 3-4 years.

These sessionals are not uneducated or unskilled. Like myself they have Honours degrees and teaching qualifications from sandstone universities in this country. Year after year (I have been employed for 11 consecutive semesters) they often allow themselves to be exploited because they love their students and their colleagues. But they are exploited. For a full time teaching load in 2004, sessional lecturers earn less than $10,000.

This is not a fair day s wage for a fair day s work.

It is not a living wage.

The Unions have done nothing. When HREOC was approached about the violations of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, involved in this situation, they were shocked at its dimensions. However they advised that because Australia had no Bill of Rights, there was nothing they could do.

Is a need in this country for a Bill of Rights something that the Bishops, out of their concern for social justice, could explore?

from: Steve Astill SJ, 11 Nov

I am just writing to thank you for the very insightful article on Muslim and Chrisitan ways by Trish Madigan. Through living in Nigeria for the last 10 years - yes, still as a chaplain - I have been next door to a Muslim Centre and have made some friends, had some ceremonies, etc, with them. Indeed as you say, we have much in common. In the post 9/11 world, even more imperatively than previously, we must look for commonality.

Our Nigerian situation is an interesting one: that is why I am still here!

from: Brian Haill, Frankston, Victoria 19 Nov

My word, what a veritable feast there was in the last issue! (NOV 17)

Who couldn't write a letter after reading "Parishes need better communications", "Media missing from evangelisation vision", and "Islamic leaders line up to meet Pell". They carry the same thread: an inability, almost a refusal, by the Catholic clergy to communicate!

Irony is heaped on irony when we reflect that the main offenders have as their mission in life to communicate the Word.

But to cases in point:-

Fr Brian Lucas has been known for years as the spokesman for the Church and I find it staggering that he of all people should be talking about the need for better internal communications some two thousand years after the arrival of the Word. His brief has been to communicate, and as the spokesman for the church he should have gone into action ages ago.After all, as he himself says, it's the internal communications that are so threadbare.

Communications ought to be a key item on the seminary syllabus. Indeed, a course in journalism might be more to the point - out there in the marketplace at a recognised school, such as the RMIT.

There's always been a gulf between most clergy and laity at the parish level - much of it brought about by vanity or arrogance or a mix of both, or as Fr Lucas prefers to put it: "a sometimes domineering and controlling personality".

His comment regarding the "lack of willingness by clergy to permit and trust in lay participation" also speaks volumes. Clergy just find it almost impossible to acknowledge that we're all part of the royal priesthood. That we share it. It's almost as if a shudder goes through the clerical ranks at the thought of it!

Reminds me of the squabbles between the disciples even when Jesus was among them...as to who will sit where. And translated down to our own times perhaps some clergy are counting on heaven being a layered society.

I reject Fr Lucas' recommendation that lay people ought to undertake responsibility for the formation of a "communicating community". He needs to be reminded that that's the precise brief for the clergy! And then he should pass it on.

Michael Mullins in his Catholic Media Watch confirms what I'm saying in his comment and particular reference to Melbourne and Archbishop Hart's efforts at evangelisation.

It just didn't occur to Archbishop Hart...even though while titling his pastoral letter "We Are Sent"...that the "We" is meant to include not only him but all of the clergy from the Pope down. There were never meant to be any exclusions.

There is no mention of communications within the pastoral letter because the archbishop isn't communicating, he's only putting pen to paper, or finger to keyboard.

It would be a kind thought for Santa to pop an RMIT media course invitation into the archbishop's Christmas stocking.

You know, when we all reflect on things we can better understand now why the Word was made flesh: because the Word needs to be seen in action!

It's this lack of understanding throughout the clergy at large, this confoundingly stunning deficiency that has made communication a stranger in the church. Perhaps the reason too for the shutters of silence the church pulls down when it simply refuses to accept that it has an obligation and a duty to respond. That said, Fr Lucas has a golden opportunity to redeem himself at the upcoming Australian Bishops Conference which will also be welcoming home Cardinal Pell who could also beneft from that same Christmas gift that we've suggested Santa might bring Archbishop Hart.

There's been a great kerfuffle over the good Cardinal's reported speech in the US which has Islamic community leaders here queuing up to have a word with him.

That famous phrase, to be "taken out of context" is always a handy defence if the frying pan catches fire but it's a bit lame when the Sydney Archdiocese's Executive Director of the Commission for Ecumenism and Interfaith relations, Sr Giavanni Farquer, who's offered that excuse neglects to remedy the situation there and then.

After all, she has the full copy of the speech. Why should the world, quite apart from the offended brethren, have to wait on some magazine to publish it next month?

My suggestion is that Cardinal Pell should put aside his weighty thesaurus, perhaps offering it as a doorstop for some needy parish, and get into the business of simple English. There's less risk by keeping it simple. That was an area Jesus was concerned about to the degree that he used parables so that no one, but no one, could be under any misapprehension.

Some might be concerned that the Cardinal is also returning from a visit to a Vox Clara meeting to which is entrusted the job of translating liturgical texts - significantly the Roman Missal - into English! Not many would want to subsequently learn that extracts there have been taken out of context!

And, to finish, who wouldn't take the opportunity to give thanks to Online Catholics for the celebration of its first 6 months of existence?

My word - it's a godsend!

from: Eileen O Neill 18 November

Re the discussion about convoluted and obscure ecclesiastical language:
in his book called, I think, A Short History of the World, Geoffrey Blainey has a chapter on Jesus and remarks that the parables give a wonderful picture of first-century Palestine. I suppose this shows that the Lord kept his teaching very close to the lives and concerns of his listeners.

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