We extend a cordial invitation to you for our special book launch event with the renowned Australian theologian, Professor Tracey Rowland.

Professor Rowland is currently the John Paul II Research Professor at the University of Notre Dame Australia and a member of the Pontifical Academy for the Social Sciences.

She is a former member of the International Theological Commission and the former Dean of the John Paul II Institute for Marriage and the Family (Melbourne). In 2021 Professor Rowland was awarded the prestigious Ratzinger Prize for her work in theology and especially for her work on the thought of Cardinal Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI.

She is in extremely high demand as a speaker and author on the international stage and we are deeply honoured that she could afford the Thomas More Centre her time and support.

The launch in collaboration with Parousia Media will make available at a special price Professor Rowland’s most recent book, in which she reminds her readers in a series of very readable essays about the true nature of the Church in a time of confusion and social instability.

Book Launch - Unconformed to the Age: Essays in Catholic Ecclesiology

Date: Wednesday, October 16, 2024
Time: 7.15pm - 9pm
Venue: St Peter’s Parish Centre – 581 Toorak Road, Toorak, Victoria

See flyer below.

The event is free and all are welcome. Please book your spot here for catering purposes.

"With her new book, Tracey Rowland confirms her position as one of the first-ranking Catholic theologians in the world …  This book is grounded in the conviction that the Catholic Church is the salt and light of the world; everything that happens in the Church has a direct impact on the course of human history. Rowland emphasises that the Church is always called to respond to human history and culture with the transforming light of the Gospel and the supernatural power of Christ’s saving grace." - Fr. Jarosław Kupczak, O.P. Pontifical University of John Paul II


Prayers and support for Cardinal-Elect, Mykola Bychok

The Thomas More Centre also welcomes with enthusiasm this week’s news of the naming by Pope Francis of Bishop Mykola Bychok CSsR as Cardinal-Elect for the College of Cardinals.

The bishop is the sixth cardinal from the history of the Ukrainian Catholic Church, and at 44, he is the youngest cardinal in the college by many years.

Bishop Bychok was consecrated as the eparchial bishop of the Ukrainian Catholic Church in Australia in 2020. He is based at the Ukrainian Catholic Church of St Michael’s in north Melbourne.

Bishop Bychok was born in Ternopil in western Ukraine and he entered the Redemptorist Order and trained for the priesthood in Lviv, Ukraine.

Ternopil has had a fraught history, originally founded as a Polish city in the 1540s as a base from which the invading Tartars could be repelled. It was razed in the 1600s by invading Turkish forces and in the 1700s became part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It was again destroyed by the Red Army after the Russian Revolution, and then again by the Soviet Army during the Second World War, and then absorbed into the USSR.

It is not surprising that freedom and faith should appear so often in Bishop Bychok’s homilies and speeches. His theological studies have been devoted to the pastoral and missionary work of young people. He has worked in youth ministry for the Ukrainians in parishes in Siberia, Poland, Ukraine and in Newark, New Jersey before coming to Australia.

Some of the NSW TMC community belong to the liturgical choir for the English-language Byzantine liturgy at St Andrew’s Ukrainian Church, Lidcombe. They have spoken of their regard for the courage and clarity of the young bishop of the Ukrainians.

Bishop Bychok has spoken clearly about the challenge to the Ukrainian community of a new challenge of Western (rather than Marxist) secularisation.

This week the Cardinal-Elect was photographed praying at the tomb of Cardinal George Pell at St Mary’s Cathedral in Sydney. Bishop Bychok said that the deceased cardinal “was a true apostle of Christian values” despite the persecution and hostility he faced.

Bishop Mykola said, “I ask everyone to pray for me, so that the Lord may give me the strength to fulfil the vocation entrusted to me by the Holy Church with dignity.”

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Anna Krohn
Executive Director
Thomas More Centre