Today we fly home from Lord Howe Island. It has been a wonderful experience. The views are spectacular, the snorkelling a glorious kaleidoscope of colourful corals and fish, the people friendly and the food delicious. Yet the thing that I will carry strongest in my heart is the way this community preserves its sense of community. Two of the greatest threats to the community are isolation and the...
I boarded a crowded train a few weeks back. It was a day when my tremor was particularly bad. A thoughtful woman offered to find me a seat, which I declined. Then as I struggled to manoeuvre my phone into an already full bag another passenger tried to help me. Without saying a word he unzipped the bag, took my phone from me and put it inside the bag. Part of me was thankful that a complete...
Natalie Jean Wood died in her Surry Hills home sometime between 2003 and 2006. Her body lay undiscovered until July this year. For more than eight years no-one noticed she was gone, no-one missed her, no-one mourned her passing. I wonder if the same thing could happen in my street. I live in suburban Australia. The village, a world where communities were small and neighbours shopped, socialised...
One of my favourite comments on the church is found in Eminence, a novel by Australian author Morris West, which tells the story of Luca Rossini, a Cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church. Luca who now serves in the Vatican, lives in the shadow of a terrible experience he suffered as a young priest in Argentina. It was the 1970′s, a time when the military junta that ruled Argentina acted with...