As you are well aware 20 million people in Pakistan have been affected by the worst floods the country has seen in decades.

Caritas Australia has launched an appeal and will work with communities now and in the long-term to improve hygiene practices, provide access to clean water, repair community infrastructure and provide emergency shelter, to at least 60,000 people over the next 10 months.

The following excerpts come from an open and honest expression of the views Bishop Kevin Dowling on the current state of the Church. Bishop Dowling is a Redemptorist, who worked as the Roman base of his Order from 1988 to 1990, before returning to his native South Africa as a Bishop. This address was originally given on 1st July 2010, “off the record”, to a group of influential lay Catholics, but subsequently it became public news and was published online with Bishop Dowling’s permission by the National Catholic Reporter (NCR) on July 8th.

VENERABLE BISHOPS, Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, and I were the youngest theologians at the Second Vatican Council from 1962 to 1965. Now we are the oldest and the only ones still fully active. I have always understood my theological work as a service to the Roman Catholic Church. For this reason, on the occasion of the fifth anniversary of the election of Pope Benedict XVI, I am making this appeal to you in an open letter

At last weekend’s Kirchentag event in Munich, where Pope Benedict was once archbishop, there was disappointment that he did not attend. The massive interchurch gathering, for the second time in its history involving Catholics as well as Protestants, was a striking sign that ecumenism can still warm the blood in the land of Martin Luther, even if the impression is given that the Vatican has gone cold on the subject. The Pope was in Portugal, attending a big celebration at the shrine of Fatima. But it would be misleading to interpret this as a retrograde retreat into simplistic pieties. The Catholic Church in Portugal, as elsewhere in Europe, is struggling to come to terms with a pervasive spirit of secularism.

Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin asked Timothy Radcliffe, former Master of the Dominicans, to lead the priests of Dublin in a day of reflection last December. Here are some of the challenging things he offered – they certainly warrant our reflection and discussion.

What a land of extremes Australia is! What a place of extremes is the whole world! Massive floods have covered western Queensland from north to south, not to mention many areas of the east coast of Queensland as well. These waters have caused damage, big damage, but also brought new life and hope to all that part of the country, and gradually to the south as well.

Often, we priests are consumed by a destructive activism in our service of the people. Indeed, this crisis of sexual abuse may aggravate the temptation to show that we at least are wonderful priests incessantly devoted to our work, always available on our mobile phones. That is salvation by works and not by grace.

Pope Benedict XVI has created a new canonical structure that opens the door to what could amount to a half a million Anglicans and some 60 of their bishops entering into full communion with Rome.

The Year for Priests is also for those men who have left priestly ministry, according to Benedict XVI’s secretary of state. Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone made this observation in the L’Osservatore Romano, in an interview that also explains how the Year for Priests became a reality.

The Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, has dismissed fears that Pope Benedict XVI plans to roll back major ecclesial changes introduced by the Second Vatican Council.