Search Results: lent
St Valentines Day 2016 Resource
Him & Her – The Joy of Difference The Australian Catholic Marriage & Family Council has released its 2016 St Valentine’s Day handout, this time exploring sexual complementarity. From the ACMFC website: In 2010, the Bishops Commission for Pastoral Life launched the St Valentine’s Day initiative. We are delighted to offer you our 2016 edition…
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St Valentine’s Day 2015
This post is reposted from The Australian Catholic Marriage & Family Council In 2010, the Bishops Commission for Pastoral Life launched the St Valentine’s Day initiative. We are delighted to offer you our 2015 edition which continues our ongoing desire to use the innate joyfulness of the feast of St Valentine to promote and affirm…
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St Valentine for the Modern Church
For a number of years we have been involved in the St Valentine’s Day initiative of the Australian Catholic Marriage and Family Council. It’s a simple project: provide an easily reproducible print kit to Catholic parishes, schools and family movements with content relevant to married and engaged couples. When talking about this resource we get…
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Together again… for stronger and better
Contrary to popular belief, separation does not always end in divorce. Well supported, the process of separation can help a couple address their problems and reconcile stronger and better. Reconciliation between separated couples is not that uncommon – about 10-15% according to some commentators. Although headed for divorce, these couples reversed course and repaired their…
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Sexual Integrity in a Messed-up World
Last month we convened a national symposium to explore how we, as a church community, might pastorally respond more effectively to those impacted by pornography. While not a fun topic, it is an important one. Important for three reasons. Firstly, pornography usage has been normalised and is now endemic, and not just among men, or…
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Our Father-in-Awe
Earlier this week, Francine had a routine medical procedure. Predictably, one of the nurses asked, “Are you related to Professor Pirola?” She was referring to Byron’s father, a recently-retired medical specialist who enjoyed a long career in our local community. “Yes”, Francine replied, “He’s my father-in-awe”*. That brought a laugh, before the inevitable follow up…
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Burn the Boats
A recent analysis of modern day wedding vows reveal around a third of couples shunning the traditional commitment for life. According to the results, 34% dumped the phrase ‘until death do us part’. This really shouldn’t surprise us as the prevailing messages young couples hear is that divorce is not only commonplace, it’s also to…
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When I am winning, WE are usually losing
“You can either be right, or you can be one, but you can’t be both”. Our mentors were talking to us about a frustrating argument, and we were both digging in. They were right, of course, but we struggled to put it into practice. It would not be the last time either. Like just this…
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Couple Prayer
by Ron and Mavis Pirola In this year of Prayer and in preparation for the Jubilee Year of 2025, Pope Francis calls us to rediscover the great value and absolute need for prayer in personal life, in the life of the Church and in the world. So, what would be a better time to address…
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