One of the most evocative words in the English language is the word “flourishing”. It is a word that provokes a wide range of poetic, personal and theological truths. The English word itself derives from the Old French word florir, which means to flower or to be full of life and healthy growth. There is an…
When I was in Grade 5, in my local Catholic primary school, our large and often unwieldy composite class (Grades 5 & 6) must have been a trial for any teacher. It was a strange time to be at school. Classical classrooms were making way for experimental methods and catechisms were being replaced by rather…
To wrap up such a lively and momentous experience as last weekend’s TMC Summer Conference, “Christianity and the Common Good”, is a challenge. This week our TMC teams are aiming to “value-add” and share the wealth of content and insight from the conference with you, our readers. The day was refreshing, because it was deliberately…
This January in the south of our continent has been a tough one for our rural and regional people. The wild winds, bursts of stinking heat and even wilder grass fires have exacted a great toll on the land, on animals, on farms and on the lives of people. Some areas are anxiously praying for…
On this Australia Day weekend, it seems very fitting that we encourage our wonderful readers and supporters to consider attending our forthcoming interactive conference day and dinner, which is dedicated to the topic of “Christianity and the Common Good” (book here). We are aware that the notion of “the common good” can seem very vague…
We are probably all entering the new year of 2026 with a fragile flickering of hope and along with some trepidation. Not only are the international and national reports troubling and downright puzzling, but here in Victoria on Friday, January 9, we endured a disturbing day of ferocious heat and even more ferocious wind, the…
In an address to the United Nations in 2006 in New York at a commission entitled, “Measures to Eliminate International Terrorism”, the Vatican’s then Permanent Observer Monsignor Celestino Migliore argued that effective national and global counter-terrorism involves a delicate and principled series of strategies and responses. He said: “Terrorism is a cultural manifestation – in the sense of…
1. 100th Edition of the Thomas More Centre Newsletter It is hard to believe that we are into the second week of Advent 2025 and that this is our 100th edition of the Thomas More Centre newsletter. Huge thanks to so many of our readers for sending emails, texts and even in-person comments of appreciation…
The eminent Ratzinger scholar and theologian of culture Professor Tracey Rowland, in her 2019 book Portraits of Spiritual Nobility: Chivalry, Christendom, and Catholic Culture (Angelico Press, 2019), unfurls in a series of intimate miniatures her memories of and respect for those cultures, movements and people who exemplify “spiritual nobility”. These portraits are drawn from the epochal figures…
One of the first fiction books that I read as a child was written in what I thought then was seriously small grown-up fonts. The book was C.S. Lewis’ first in The Chronicles of Narnia series, the classic The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. The book, first published in 1950, is 75 years old this year. HarperCollins…