I 3 5"-
c Record 450 Hay Street. Perth, G.P.O. Box
memos, AUDIT
eiBUREAU OF RCULATIONSAL.
No. 2047. PERTH, THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 1977
adik
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MERCY NUNS' ACTION CALL FOR JUSTICE From PETER DIGHT, in Melbourne. `V,
Three thousand five hundred Sisters of Mercy throughout Australia have been called on to take more action for social justice as part of a renewal of their religious life. The call was one of five They teach 100,000 childproposals put forward by ren in more than 400 Cathfirst national assembly olic primary and secondary of the biggest order of Ca- schools. tholic Sisters in Australia. There are 1,000 students The week-long assembly, at four tertiary colleges. which brought more than Twenty five hospitals and 800 Mercy Sisters to Melbourne from New Zealand, infirmaries, and 12 homes for the aged, care for anoPapua-New Guinea and around Australia. ended on ther 2,300 people. Saturday at St. Aloysius' Mercy sisters also look College, North Melbourne. after 800 children in 46 It was organised by the children's cottages and eight Conference of the Sisters of large homes.
4,
the
Mercy of Australia. The conference is the first national organisation of the order, which has 17 separate constituent groups.
TOUGH CHALLENGES Sister Patricia Pak Poy, the very poor, and among of Adelaide, executive dir- young mothers suffering isoector of the conference, said lation in new outer subur-
Welcome to
Priest acquitted on banned
a "House
-
of God"
4
Children in Polnotional dress
ish
lead
procession out of the church at Maylands lost Sun a
lay beneath a sign saying- "Welcome, Archbishop, to the Polish House of God
(
See also Page 3)
......1,11,11...I.P.M.04.41,1
Sister Patricia said that Mercy sisters were also working individually or in small groups with homeless women, drug addicts, handicapped children and adults, Aborigines, migrants,
PRETORIA (NC) A South African court has acquitted a leading spokesman for the South African bishops of all three charges he faced over the possession or distribution of banned materials. court said that Do,ntnican Father Arnold Dominic Scholten (47) general secretary of the Southern African Bishops' Conference, was not shown by the Government to have willfully committed the alleged offen-
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ces or to have been negli-
previous September.
gent
in ensuring that the material allegedly in his po-
Father Scholten said that
had received and kept ssession was banned. the pamphlet in the normal course of his duties and was In Father Scholten's .trial in mid -July, the Dutch -born unaware of its banning. priest did not deny having After that, he said at his had the banned literature in trial, he had learned how to his possession. obtain the official government publication in which "RELIGIOUS" bans are announced and orBut the defence contend- dered a subscription to it by ed that the materials were mail. of a religious nature and The other two charges therefore not legally subject were that he subsequently to banning. and that, in any distributed two banned pubcase, Father Scholten had lications "The Voice," exercised the reasonable and "Torture in South Afcare that could have been rid." expected of him and could not be expected to have But in one of these cases been aware of the hannings. the date of the ban was only he
-
The first charge came four days before the docuwhen he was arrested last ment was allegedly found in April for possession of a the mail sent by Father pamphlet published by the Scholten. Chrisian Institute of South In the other case the ban Africa. entitled "South Afrioccurred five days before ca Police State." the document was allegclly It had been banned the mailed.
-A
-
The chairman of the Headmasters' Conference of Schools, Independent Paul Mr. McKeown, called last week for a tax rebate system that removed some of the financial burden on parents sending children to private schools.
that the assembly had faced ban housing estates. up to some tough challenges
from speakers and partici- DISPLACING TEAL pants.
"We were told, for example, that our life, our vows and our work might not have much impact on Australians nowadays," she said. "Some of our Sisters felt that we had drifted away from the order's vision of caring for the poor, the sick and the uneducated. "Some even suggested that our property and prestige made us part of our sodety's injustices to groups like Aborigines, migrants and women."
TEACHING
GOALS' "Running all these institutions can displace our real goals with a concentration on false efficiency," she said.
'This week's assembly asked the conference to strengthen its administration, releasing more Sisters for full-time national work.
"They would help Sisters
of Mercy review the quality of their work, rather than just looking at the number of institutions and the amount of work they do."
Other proposals from the HOSPITALS, ETC. assembly included: About one quarter of Australia's nuns are Mercy (0 CONTINUED PAGE 2) Sisters. OP SEE ALSO PAGE 7)
A tax concessional rebate on school fees that covered the gap between the per capita grant and the average cost of educating a child in a Government school would he a great help to parents, he said.
Mr. McKeown said the Federal Government was inconsistent in paying all student fees at tertiary level but not all fees in schools. "Our view, which is an certainly idealistic one, is that the Governthat
ment should support, at a suitable level, the education of each child in the community," he said. 41411410.41400.41.4/1.114IIP414141.1141
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