A Melbourne bishop aims to lead with gospel hope as he becomes the 11th Archbishop of the Anglican Diocese of Adelaide.
The Right Reverend Bradly Billings was elected as the new archbishop and Metropolitan of South Australia on 6 December.
He currently oversees 64 parishes and authorised congregations in the Oodthenong Episcopate of the Anglican Diocese of Melbourne.
With the signing into law of the first Treaty between First Peoples and the people of Victoria, we are living through a moment of profound cultural and spiritual significance.
Truth-telling, recognition of First Peoples, and a growing desire for a more just relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples are shaping a new story for our state.
Treaty is not a single event but an unfolding movement — a collective turning toward truth, Country, and a more honest way of living together.
Jillian Hishon spent 38 years of her life in a secretive sect before she was silenced and removed for marrying an outsider.
Very little is known about the group, which goes by various names including The Two by Twos or The Church With No Name.
But with an intimate knowledge of the inner workings of this fundamentalist Christian sect that operates without formal governance, Ms Hishon has devoted hundreds of hours listening to an estimated 280 victims of historical child sexual abuse from within the church she grew up in.
As Australians begin Christmas and summer breaks, around the world 50 million people will toil in modern slavery.
That’s according to the International Labour Organisation. South Asia and Southeast Asia are among the worst places for exploitation. It’s something anti-slavery advocates are urging consumers to investigate when they consider Christmas purchases.
A famous Australian beach erupts in violence. Graeme Cole joins us from Cronulla on the 20th anniversary of the riots and the story that evolved.
Religious freedoms and threats to the Christian faith are at the forefront of a new podcast which assesses upcoming or already implemented laws and legislature.The Freedom Matters podcast, launched on 18 November, bills itself as a “quarterly update on current and emerging threats to religious freedom,” with the first episode focusing on anti-discrimination laws in the states, territories, and federally.
The Church of England is to launch a poster campaign aimed at challenging the anti-migrant message of Tommy Robinson, whose “Unite the Kingdom” movement has urged its supporters to join a carols event next weekend to “put the Christ back into Christmas”.
The posters, which will go on display at bus stops, say “Christ has always been in Christmas” and “Outsiders welcome”.
They will also be available for local churches to download and display over the festive period.
Vicarages in London are to be hit by the “mansion tax,” Parliament has been told.
The Lord Bishop of Manchester, The Right Reverend Dr David Walker, stressed that even in relatively poor parishes in the capital and some parts of the wider South East, vicarages are worth more than £2 million so would be caught by the new levy.
He emphasised that these were not “large and luxurious” properties but because of their location they had a high value.
A growing number of Britons who leave Christianity are turning to paganism or other forms of spiritualism instead of converting to other major religions, a new study has found.
The survey, released by the Institute for the Impact of Faith in Life, questioned 2,774 adults who self-identified as having “experienced a change in their religious belief,” seeking to provide insight into “how, why, and in what direction Britons are moving between faiths, spiritualities, and non-belief.”
The researchers conclude that “Britain is not secularising in a straightforward way” but rather “undergoing a re-composition of belief, a shift away from inherited institutional structures towards personalised, practice-based, and wellbeing-oriented forms of faith.”
A high-level Vatican commission voted against allowing Catholic women to serve as deacons, maintaining the global Church’s practice of all-male clergy, according to a report given to Pope Leo and released on Thursday.
The commission, in a 7-1 vote, said historical research and theological investigation “excludes the possibility” of allowing women to serve as deacons at this time but recommended further study of the issue.
Discussions about the possibility of women deacons, who are ordained and can assist with Church services but cannot celebrate Mass, have convulsed the 1.4 billion-member Church for the past decade.
Sabrina Ali grew up in a South Asian home in Canton, a multicultural suburb of Detroit, and said she learned from a young age that she couldn’t talk about her mental health struggles with her immigrant parents.
“It was like they just came from a totally different world … and for them it was like, ‘Well, what do you have to be depressed about? Like, you’re 13, you have a good home, you have a good family, like, you have food on the table,’” said Ali, now a stay-at-home mother and former teacher.
