Following is the full text of Bishop Pat Power's letter to the organisers of the Petition to the Australian Catholic Bishops which Bishop Power released for publication on 21 August 2007…
Open Letter to Petition Organisers...

Paul Collins and Frank Purcell
PO Box 4053
MANUKA ACT 2603

Dear Paul and Frank,

I write in response to your letter of 18 June which I presume was sent to the other Australian Bishops as well. Both of you and the other signatories to the letter are people who have made significant contributions to the Church in Australia and I believe that the issues you raise are of concern to the majority of practising Catholics around Australia. Daily, I hear people express such concerns along with the frustration that their voices are being ignored.

At the heart of the issue is the relationship of the local church to the universal church. I nominated this as a possible subject for the last Synod held in Rome, but there was little support for my proposal. However, for a number of years (some people would say since the beginning of Pope John Paul II's pontificate in 1978) there has been a greater encroachment on the life of the local church which has given the diocesan bishop and his collaborators little scope for effective leadership. I clearly recognise the need for the local church to be in communion with the See of Peter but there needs to be much more reciprocity in the relationship. Circumstances vary enormously around the world and many of the issues your letter raises will have differing consequences in other countries and cultures. That was apparent to me at the 1998 Oceania Synod of Bishops when so many bishops of our region highlighted the particular problems they were facing. Unless diocesan bishops are allowed to exercise the powers intrinsic to their office, many urgent questions will be neglected. The ecumenical movement suggests that we should be seeking unity in diversity. Surely such wisdom needs applying to the Church as a whole. The New Testament shows the first disciples' readiness to embrace such an approach.

Where there is the conviction that the Eucharist is at the heart of Catholic belief and practice, there must be questions asked about disciplinary laws in the Church which have the net effect of denying many Catholics regular access to the Eucharist. This was the precise argument advanced by the National Council of Priests in Australia in the lead-up to the last Synod of Bishops which discussed the Eucharist. They argued that there is little sense in pointing to the centrality of the Eucharist when an increasing number of Catholics in many parts of the world are being deprived of the Eucharist because of the scarcity of priests.

On many occasions since my ordination as bishop in 1986, I have pleaded for consideration of the ordination of married men and the possibility of those who have married to be able to return to the active ministry. I wrote a letter to that effect to Pope John Paul when he visited Australia at the end of that year. In the ensuing twenty years, I have publicly canvassed such views on a number of occasions and I gave voice to them at the 1998 Oceania Synod. But consistent with many papal and other Vatican pronouncements, there has been no acceptance of those views at that level. Yet invariably when I have made such statements the overwhelming response I have received from ordinary Catholics has been one of support and a sense of urgency that the official Church needs to act decisively to bring about reform.

In our own Archdiocese in line with the experience of other parts of Australia, parishes generally and priests personally are under added pressure with an increasing load being borne by a diminishing and ageing clergy. The irony is that in this Archdiocese there are between thirty and forty priests who have married and thereby been debarred from active priestly ministry. Many of them and their families are active in parishes and other areas of Church life, but they are unable to celebrate the Eucharist. There was a recent instance where a priest failed to arrive for Mass and a married priest and his wife sat rather helplessly in the congregation while an acolyte and other members of the parish attempted to lead a liturgy of the word with Holy Communion.

Of course, dioceses need to continue in their efforts to recruit men for the celibate priesthood but the limited response must say something in terms of a long-term solution. Many dioceses have recruited priests from overseas with mixed success. Some such priests have fitted very well into the life of the diocese while others have struggled with issues of culture, language and vision of Church. In any case such solutions can only be partial and short-term.

Your fourth point relating to the participation of women in the life of the Church is crucial for a healthy, life-giving and nurturing Church. While women's roles in the family, Catholic education and health-care are obvious, the opportunities for leadership in terms of the universal, diocesan and even parish Church are extremely limited. The 1997 inquiry into the participation of women in the Church in Australia brought out many of the gaps for which the whole Church, not just women, is the poorer. While I recognise the sensitivity to the question at the level of the Vatican, I am also aware that many loyal and committed Catholics want a more open and thorough examination of the issues around the ordination of women and the whole structure of the priesthood. A less clerical model of the priesthood is more in tune with 21st century societal values and arguably more faithful to the practice of the early Christian communities.

The opportunity which your letter gives for the whole people of God to claim a greater share of ownership in the life of the Church in Australia is most welcome. I hope that the spirit of dialogue promoted by Pope Paul VI in his encyclical Ecclesiam suam and the spirit and teaching of the Second Vatican Council will be brought to bear on the discussions you seek to engender.

Yours sincerely,

(Bishop) Pat Power

source: http://catholica.com.au/gc1/pp/002_pp_210807.php?id=5991

Canberra Auxiliary Bishop Pat Power has questioned current Church discipline that has the effect of denying regular access to the Eucharist saying that it's time for a less "clerical" understanding of the priesthood.

The bishop has written to the organisers of a petition calling for the ordination of married men to the priesthood, Paul Collins and Frank Purcell.

He suggested the heart of the issue is the link between the local Church and the universal Church. He said he'd nominated this as a possible subject for the last Synod in Rome, but received little support.

Bishop Power said: "Unless diocesan bishops are allowed to exercise the powers intrinsic to their office, many urgent questions will be neglected."

He also said that a less clerical model of priesthood would foster the participation of women in the leadership of the Church.

in http://www.cathnews.com/news/708/123.php

To:  The Australian Catholic Bishops' Conference

We, the undersigned Australian Catholics, wish to express our support for our bishops who are preparing the Australian Catholic Church for new forms of ministry and leadership. We request the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference to place the following items on the agenda for their plenary meeting in November this year, 2007.

We ask that the Bishops:

1. Acknowledge that there is a major crisis in ministry within the Australian Catholic Church.

2. Acknowledge that there is no doctrinal or theological barrier to the ordination of married men. The Australian Church has already ordained married former Anglican priests.

3. Take practical steps toward ordaining suitably qualified married men.

4. Encourage a wide-ranging discussion of the role of women in ministry and in the authority structures of the Church, including the question of women’s ordination.

5. Establish appropriate scriptural, theological and pastoral training programs (campus, distance and online) to prepare suitable women and men for ministry. These candidates should have the recommendation of their parishes and communities, and should participate in mentored pastoral work.

6. Invite priests who have left the ministry to return to active priesthood, subject to negotiation with the local bishop.

We do this because of our growing concern that three serious issues are putting the future of the Catholic Church in Australia at risk:

• the increasingly acute shortage of suitable priests to maintain our Mass-centred, Eucharistic spirituality and the celebration of the other sacraments;
• The increasing drift of young people from the Church because of the difficulties we face in our ministry to them;
• the lack of full leadership roles for women.

The An appeal to the Australian Catholic Bishops to ordain priests for our parishes Petition to The Australian Catholic Bishops' Conference was created by and written by Paul Collins & Frank Purcell (fpurcell@mcmedia.com.au).

source: http://www.petitiononline.com/PF2544/petition.html

The Bishop Abbesses

            I have seen their closiers, not their miters.  Today, 1^st of August 2007, I looked for the women saints who had the title “Abbess.”  I found none in the liturgical calendar made after Vatican II.  Women have lost a lot after Vatican Council II.

            The Abbesses of monasteries were autonomous, independent.  They had all the jurisdiction in their monasteries to carry out the liturgical functions, except Mass.  They had solemn liturgies where celebrations demanded the wearing of solemn vestments fitting the occasion.  But today all has to be approved by men whatever exists in these monasteries. Excuse my ignorance if I am not updated.  What I found common to the majority of them is the title: “Virgin - Virgin – Virgin.”  St. Gertrude studied literature and philosophy and was truly a Cistercian monk.  She has only “Virgin”, as a title.  But she was a great woman.  So was St. Brigid of Sweden, a married woman, whose life both as a mother and a religious after the death of her husband, she saw her daughter coming up to holiness, till finally she became a saint known as St. Catherine of Sweden.  An extraordinary woman was St. Brigid.

            It is not the women saints who are looking for public recognition.  But rather fairness to the half of humanity which is crying for justice in the Catholic Church, the WOMEN.  They are not fairly represented in the governing circles of the Roman Catholic Church.  There is no dicastry in the Roman Curia, which is headed by women.  How long will the Catholic Church deprive the people of God the talents hidden in women?

The Spirituality of the Women Foundresses

Of The Religious Congregations

            The church boasts today of many saints.  It is said that with all the methods of making statistics, the Church has failed to count the number of the religious congregations of women.  They are so generous to God and to humanity, and just offer themselves wholly in the work of salvation.  They have love for mankind which carries them to any extent as the needs for human services demand.

            Be it the foundresses and their followers, abide by what God has called them to do in the economic of salvation for mankind.  The heroic actions of many congregations of women are more than edifying.  They cannot all be recorded.  Only mothers are capable to do what they have done, and are still doing.

            Let us look at a deep thought of a woman saint, meditating on the following words of Psalm 139:1-3.  The general title of her meditation is: “Living in God’s presence, by St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, 1774-1821: “What is most striking in this is that when we sin, we not only sin in the presence of God, but in God Himself, for since He is the source of motion and life, it follows that the sinner uses concurrence of God Himself to offend and sin against Him, turning the means of life: health, time, the powers of nature and space to this horrid perversion and abuse against their Almighty Giver.”  How many of us have looked at sin through the spiritual eyes of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton.  What she says is clear naked truth, there is no need to consider that what she says comes from a woman.  What a beautiful conclusion she makes of her reflection on sin: “What a deep thought,” she says, “that God Himself is the very life of our being.  He dwells in the soul of each one of us as in His own element.”  But why do we forget Him when we are sinning?  We put a blind-folder on His face so that we can sin freely.  St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, putting herself in the shoes of God, felt the pinch of sinning as we turn our face against God.  We are grateful to her as she put it so simply as to make us understand how we ignore God who is with us and in us when we sin.

            Only a woman could say what St. Catherine of Siena said during her high spiritual moods, as to what extent she would go to prevent people from going to hell: “Lord,” she prayed, “let me stand at the gates of hell and stop anyone from entering by telling each of them, ‘where are you going, poor fool?  Turn back!  Make a good confession and save your soul.  Don’t come here, to be lost for all eternity.”  This is a woman speaking, sharing with us what she feels of what it means to go to hell. She expresses in a simple way, but what she says contains how she felt for people who were not serious about their salvation.  She would be ready to set up a school at the door of hell, and tell them the danger of what it means to lose  one’s soul into hell.

            It is to her merits that we still have the Pope residing at Rome, since he left Avignon, France.  How poorly she was treated when she arrived in France to bring the Pope back to Rome.  She was in her thirties, a young woman.  Speaking with authority to the papal guards that she had a mission to carry out by divine orders to bring the Pope to Rome.  They notified the parents of the pope that Catherine had come to collect the Pope to go back to Rome.  The Pope’s father swore: “Not on my back, till you jump my body.  You will not go back to Rome.”  St. Catherine looked at the Pope and said: “Holy Father, go on, break the oath of your father, cross his body, jump.”  By doing so he had to choose to belong to God or to his earthly father.  Courageously he went ahead and jumped over his father’s body.  She gave an order to the Pope not to delay as far as up to a fixed moment, which she made the Pope agree to.  He had to enter Rome with simplicity on a white horse or mule, but not with two thousand soldiers.  Who says that a woman is a weakling?  St. Catherine of Siena did not use the masculine philosophy and theology to order the Pope to come back to Rome.  She had no male advisers to make syllogisms in order to make the Pope understand the mission she had to carry out on behalf of the whole Church.

            A woman who was illiterate, having fifteen secretaries, writing letters to any ecclesiastical dignitary or head of state.  She faced soldiers who came to invade her convent.  She faces them and they are disarmed with her presence.  She writes a terrible letter to Curia Romana, blaming them for the many deviations which had made inroads in God’s Holy Church.

            Her last days, as she moved from her Dominican residence in Rome, going to St. Peter to pray, her ascetical life reduced her to such a physical weakness that people were afraid that as she walked along, she would be swept away by the wind.  She was very thin and weak.  But a woman with spiritual guts above the matriculated doctors of philosophy and theology.  She later on knew how to read and write by a miracle.  How many Catherines of Siena have been blocked to display their God given gifts under the pretext: “wait till the Church will discern as to whether your gift is truly charismatic from God or a mere natural phenomenon.”  Till they have died.

            The secret of Fatima?  Why imprison Sister Lucia?  She had never enjoyed a normal natural life.  On the other hand still today nobody knows where the truth lies about the secret of Fatima.

            You don’t discern by condemning to death St. Joan of Arc?  Neither do you discern by burning Savanarola, and throw his ashes in the Florence River?  You don’t discern by condemning with laicization 150,000 priests of God and happily sit back on a sofa watching t.v. while these thousands of priests are languishing in different ways.  And you say: “Thy kingdom come.”  For you it is there, since you have comfort and power and authority.  We don’t go into details about what the women have endured under this discernment.  How, after St. Theresa of Avilla was sent back after consulting Rome on matters very important for the renewal of the Carmelite life.  One day she was heard to say: “Why God did you make me a woman?”  She meant that all that she endured was due to the Catholic Church prejudice against women.  What was it?  The women were never treated as adults.  They could reason as men reason.  They had to depend on “a masculine thought, which came from a prepared mind.”

            In Ireland, some years back in the sixties when I was studying there, I went to a family which had invited me to have supper at their home.  To my surprise the only woman in the family was the mother.  She had given birth to nine boys.  Being the treasurer of the home, she displayed her double thinking as a woman and a man.  She watched the nine boys and they were coming up to a difficult biological stage.  She controlled their possible wayward behaviour.  They understood a lot more their mother’s instructions, since they knew that she, as a woman, had no ambition to trade her womanhood for masculinity. But that when she gave advice to them it was for their own personal benefit as boys.

            It was edifying to watch the boys being on the alert as to what next the mother had need of, and on whom will she call next?  A woman is able to bring up and give proper education to both sexes with efficacy.  The boys did not become over effeminate.  For them the commander of the house was the mother.  The father from time to time dropped in a wise word to compliment the mother’s teaching.  The Lord Almighty enlightened the woman as a mother to all that was necessary for their masculine education.   They saw as well how the father respected the mother, never contradicting her laws of the home, the queen mother of the home.  Is it possible?  Yes, a woman trusted and given opportunity becomes herself, and displays, like a peacock with extended feathers, the hidden beauty of her nature.

            Let me conclude on this marvelous lady with the words of the son of God as it is written by St. Bridget of Sweden.  She received this message: “The son of God said to the spouse (St. Bridget): “What is true wisdom that comes from God?  It consists not in the simplicity of the poor, nor in the merit of the learned, but in a truly Christian life.  The true lover of wisdom is the one who each day learns to die well, who frequently reflects upon the state in which he may be found at the hour of death; who remembers the judgment that follows it, when all that he has done will be reviewed and no fault will remain unpunished.”

            The mother with the nine boys became famous by carrying out well her motherly duties in the home.  She might have had academic qualifications, but what made her famous was the fact that she was faithful to her family, providing them with all that they needed.  She demonstrated the beauty of her Christian faith: “Through all the mothers who introduced their children to the Kingdom of God and true human life in society – may your Church bring mankind to eternal life and salvation.  We pray to the Lord.”

The Women Religious Congregations

            If ever the Christian France had something to boast of, they brought Catholicism to Quebec, Canada.  At one time the women religious upheld such a high percentage of the number of religious as high as 98%.  Today they are only 2%.  Frustration from Vatican Council II.

            It was not only the Canadian nuns who felt they were treated as immature persons, but many other women religious congregations felt the pinch for the unjust treatment.  One fact which came out publicly was the fact that while preparing proposals for the agenda of international women religious meetings in Rome, what they had prepared underwent a double check.  All was shaped according to the mental frame of Curia Romana the masculine mind.  They found out that they had only to chew the cud, already prepared for them.  This was very humiliating to all women religious.  Hence many congregations split into small groups.  Bought apartments to live in, three or five together.  They kept their salaries for their sustenance.  The consequence many left religious life.

            In one big house where there remained two old sisters, they were asked: “How long will you remain alone?”  They answered” We want to be certain that our religious congregation remains, as long as we live, it exists.”

The Church Bears The Consequences

While the People of God Are Deprived of Services

            Those were the days, when students remember, when they were taught by the Ursuline sisters, the Dominicans, the Daughters of wisdom, the Si77sters of Charity, and many others whose influence was stamped into the souls of their students.  Not only were there sisters educators, there were as well sisters of Mercy involved in many social activities, including hospitals and orphanages.  Then the missionary sisters of Africa, white sisters, who adapted themselves to any situation in the missions.  There were women religious congregations as many as human needs.

            Is the mistake made by the masculine race amendable?  I believe that the offence is forgivable, because women are mothers.  They sometimes look at men as little children with whom they cannot reason.  Men are affected by fixation about women.  They need a forty days retreat to undo the fixation.

            But a way must be found to reconcile with women.  I have no advice to give to women.  I too was a man in authority.  I do not want to make any justification for what I did to women then.  I am certain that it is due to my age that I look back and see what stupidities I did as I sat on the chair of Moses.  But you all know that not all the Moses are true Moseses.  There was only one Moses who got direct guidance from God.  Poor me, I cannot claim anything in that line.  Like the publican, without raising my head, I say “mea culpa, mea maxima culpa,” and conclude: “Forgive me Lord, for I knew not what I was doing.”

By Archbishop E. Milingo

(foto ©sacerdoti sposati)

What a it is to receive excuses from married priests, due to their fixed  ideas against Rev. Moon. Why not come to face the Unificationist  theologians, as we did during the international symposium? If they are truly theologians, let them come and compare their beliefs with what the  Unificationists believe. It is a very poor attitude; pure prejudice. What  will they say if they were to meet a Buddhist, who believes that the word  "God" is a mental creation of Christians. But Buddhists are considered  living Saints in Asia. Stop talking against Rev. Moon, if you do not want  to air your views publicly to the assembly. Buddhists are not atheists, but they will not stand you if you mention God. To them, Buddha is everything and these people take up 25% of the population of Korea.
 
When will Catholic theologians become human loving? The masculine theology with its arrogance to judge and consider every believer other than Catholic to be a fool is certainly not divine. They have the right to  judge so they believe, to condemn, and spread lies about doctrines which  they do not understand. This is intellectual idolatry of their own  beliefs.
 
Let the Italian Married Priests, who are at the source of Catholic  theology in Rome, come to help us whom they believe that we have put  ourselves under the claws of the devil. The morality of the  Unificationists as a body and a community of believers in their "Devine  Principle" is very high. They have absolute sexual morality, do not drink
alcohol, live in poverty, models of family, love living for others, rooted  in Jesus Christ. If we talk exaggerations, we too are accused of  exaggerating the role of the Blessed Virgin Mary. But one as to have patience and show them that there is no exaggeration. Mary is the new Eve, Mother of Humanity. How long will it take intellectual upper class of the Catholic Church come down to the level of the grass root? If you have  truly learnt to love as God loves, He condemns nobody. He loves everyone with his defects. "Don't judge" he says, "Leave the judgment to me."
"Don't condemn anyone, it is I who have the last word." Have we Catholics ever measured the distance covered by our charity. If our Catholic charity does not go further than our nose, than we are lost.
 
Yours Sincerely,
Archbishop E. Milingo

Thank you, Bishop Marcelo Pires, for correcting a false report.  May the Patriarch of ICAB, Dom Luis Mendes, enjoy many years of good health.  Blessings,
 
+Peter Paul Brennan
Married Priests Now!

In a message dated 8/10/2007 7:52:24 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  Bishop Marcelo Pires writes:
Estimados Irmaos em Cristo,
 
Acabo de falar por telefone com D. Luis Mendes. Ele esta gozando de boa suade e esta muito bem.
 
Infelizmente esta sendo noticiado pela Internet que nosso Patriarca havia falecido ontem, dia 9 de agosto, aos 84 anos de idade.
A noticia esta na pagina da sua Biografia. Mas, gracas a Deus, que isso foi apenas um alarme falso patrocinado por algum mesquinho de ideias curtas. Talvez algum psicopata maldoso e perigoso.
 
Aproveitemos a oportunidade e oremos por Dom Luis Mendes - nosso Patriarca.
 
Em Cristo, pelo Ideal.
 
+Marcelo Pires

google automatic translation - adapted

 
Esteem Irmaos in Christ,
 
I just finished a telephone conversation with D. Luis Mendes. he is enjoying good health and is very well.
 
Unhappily we were notified on the Internet that our Patriarch had deceased yesterday, day 9 of August, to the 84 years of age.  The news was in his biography page.
 
But, thanks to God, this was only one false alarm sponsored by some person of lowly thoughts. Perhaps some evil and dangerous psychopath.
 
Let us use to advantage the chance and let us pray for Dom Luis Mendes - our Patriarch.
 
In Christ, for the Ideal.
 
+Marcelo Pires