A Small Majority win For the Albo Government - Gilmore is retained By Fiona Phillips, Labor Party

Well, Andrew Constance, Liberal Party candidate on primary votes was over 6% on Fiona Phillips, candidate for Labor Party for Gilmore. Congratulations to Fiona Phillips on her re-election to the seat of Gilmore by 2 party-preferred differences of 242 votes. Click here for Australian Electoral Commission Results 2022. The swing against Fiona was 2.5%, leaving her with a marginal swing 0.11% lead for the next election.

Also congratulations to Albo and his Labor Party for winning the election with the same amount of seats as the Liberal Party in 2019, with 77 seats. Click here for the AEC Results 2019

Whilst Scomo dealt with fires, floods and COVID-19 Pandemic issues, let's see what issues Albo deals with. He seems to be saying he is looking only at a 2 term government. Well, he has been in office for  9 days, we need to see how he handles issues to prevent any early elections.

We know dumping Pilbo to New Environment junior ministership, is a bad way to start for Pilbo - but this may be Albo's way of dealing with the possible bullying of Senator Kitching, when she died of a sudden heart attack. The Albo Integrity Commission would be good to sort this out.

My guess is 18 months and we will be back into election mode. 16 Independents. Teal independents who claim they are not a party but confirm they were financially back by Climate 200 - Click here for details - which is founded by billionaire Robert Holmes A Court. Now they want party rights or questions in parliament, but they claim they are not a party.

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2021 Census Update - .id Informed Decisions

 

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Who Will Albo Government support the Chinese or Americans?

Well before the New Australian Prime Minister could select a full Cabinet, he want to show his face at the Quad Meeting in Tokyo. He to with him his new Foreign Affairs Minister, Penny Wong (1st person to be selected for this position not being born in Australia).

I suppose there were no fires or floods for our people to criticise him for leaving the country one day after being elected.

Obviously, he left the people of Australia behind, to focus on international relationships. Basically, in my books, he is Joe Biden number 2 or will Penny Wong swing him, to back the Chinese on Taiwan aggression from China. We will find out in time.

Quote from the article from the Guardian:

On the eve of the visit, Chinese state media put Albanese on notice that his approach to the Quad meeting would be viewed as a test of his “political wisdom” after the “anti-China strategy” pursued by the Morrison government.

My comment on the anti-China Strategy stretches back to when the first cases of Covid-19 came from Wuhan, China and they let it spread all around the world as people travelled around the world. The spread of the virus could have been stopped within China as far as I can tell. All international governments were providing relief to most of the people and businesses to make them survive. As we know there was a cost to the spread of the virus and now there are governments in Trillion Dollars in debt, I do agree on China, which allowed the spread of COVID-19, should be reimbursing every nation around the world for all debts incurred by COVID-19. Yes, I support Scomo on this issue. China should have had measures put in place to prevent the spread of the disease, once it was discovered.

here for the article from the guardian

My gut feeling, Albo will support the Americans!

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Update on the Plenary Council Catholic

 

Welcome to PlenaryPost If counting down to milestones is your thing, we today find ourselves 38 days away from the Mass to open the second assembly of the Fifth Plenary Council of Australia, with the Council's formal program to begin the following day on July 4. More than 300 people -- members, advisers, observers and support personnel -- will be in Sydney to see the celebration stage of the Plenary Council reach its conclusion. As happened during the first assembly, there will be portions of each day's proceedings live-streamed, typically in the opening session, which starts at 8.30am AEST. All Masses during the assembly will be live-streamed. A full live-streaming schedule will be shared in the next edition of PlenaryPost. The closing Mass of the Plenary Council, to be celebrated at 10.30am on Saturday, July 9 at St Mary's Cathedral, is also open to the public. The Walking in the Spirit prayer pilgrimage resources, launched on Easter Sunday, have been well received and are being used in various contexts across the country. We invite you to continue to accompany the Members and the wider Catholic community in prayer as we build up to the second general assembly. Read on for more updates on the Plenary Council and the life of the Church in Australia. As we move towards the second assembly, the Plenary Council website continues to be a useful place to stay up-to-date with what's happening and how we are walking together.

FacilitatorFocus: Send out your Spirit and renew the face of the earth by Marion Gambin rsj

Dear Friends,  As I write this Facilitator Focus for this 47th edition of PlenaryPost, I’m very mindful that we are now just over five weeks from when the Members and support personnel will gather in Sydney for the second assembly of the Plenary Council! Since the end of the first assembly, in October last year, the journey of prayer and discernment has continued, during the past eight months, as of course it will during the second assembly from July 3-9. During the month of June, the Members will be meeting each Tuesday evening, online, to make their final preparations for the assembly. You are all encouraged to accompany the Members with prayer through making use of the prayer resources - Walking in the Spirit - provided by the Liturgy Working Group and available on the Plenary Council website.  The first of these meetings will be an opportunity for the Members to engage in conversation using the Motions Framework Document. This is the document which will be used for discernment and decision-making during the second assembly and will be available to you via the Plenary Council website from next week. It is the document that has emerged from the process that you, the Catholic community, were invited into, involving listening, discernment and dialogue over the past four years, following the commencement of the Plenary Council in 2018. The Drafting Committee has worked tirelessly in the past months to incorporate the discerned responses from the Members of the Plenary Council to the "Fruits" document, which was the outcome of the first assembly. The Members will now have an opportunity to reflect on the Motions Framework Document, during the first two weeks of June, and provide any recommendations for amendments to the Drafting Committee. Listening, discernment and dialogue continue to be the essential ingredients to bring us to a place of being a more "Christ-centred, missionary Church in Australia". On June 6, we celebrate the wonderful feast of Pentecost. The response following the first reading of the liturgy for that day calls on God to send out the Spirit and renew the face of the earth. Let us all continue to pray for one another that the Spirit will renew and transform us, individually and as a faith community of missionary disciples. In the words of our Plenary Council prayer…"Lead your Church into a hope-filled future, that we may live the joy of the Gospel". Blessings of peace, Marion -- for the Facilitation Team

CuriosityCorner

We will address a new question in each e-newsletter. To catch up on previous editions, you can check out the Plenary Council FAQ page. If you have a question, email it to us and we will include it in future editions of PlenaryPost. The question for this edition is… Who will attend the Plenary Council assemblies?  There will be three main groups of people attending the Council’s assemblies: Members; Advisers; and Observers. Members of the Fifth Plenary Council of Australia are those who have been called to participate in the assemblies. Some of the members are people who “must” be called to a plenary council, as outlined in Church law; others are people who “may” be called, who were chosen through a range of processes across the country. The members have, at times, been referred to as “delegates” to the Council. The language of “member” better reflects the canonical status of those called to a Council, as well as the sense that all members are there to represent the People of God in Australia, not just their local Church community. Members are the only people who can vote at the Council assemblies. It is expected there will be 277 members participating in the second assembly. Advisers to the Council are people with particular expertise across a range of matters, such as theology, Scripture, governance, formation, ecclesiology (study of the Church), who can be called upon by members, individually or collectively, to provide advice on particular matters to assist with their discernment and decision-making. Advisers are sometimes called “experts” or “periti”, a Latin term used to describe the experts at the Second Vatican Council and other major Church events. Observers are people who, as the name suggests, observe the proceedings of the Council assemblies because of their particular relationship with the Catholic Church in Australia. Following the tradition of other Church gatherings, the observers are likely to include Catholic leaders from other parts of the world, especially New Zealand, the Pacific and Asia; leaders of other Christian denominations; and leaders of other faith traditions. The observers might attend some or all of the assemblies. The Members, Advisers and Observers will be supported by staff and volunteers helping with the facilitation of discernment, technology requirements, events management and liturgical needs. Media and communications staff will help document the national and local aspects of the Council assemblies.

TalkTheology

A time for keep silence, a time to speak There is "a time to keep silence, and a time to speak". These words, as you well know, are not my own. They are taken from the book of Ecclesiastes 3:7. There is a time for silence and a time for words. The two go together: there is not one without the other. A time of silence without a time to speak, as well as a time to speak without a time for silence, lead to unpleasant consequences. Silence should lead to speech, and speech should lead to silence. Speech without silence easily becomes hollow words. Silence without speech can easily lead to a state of apathy and irresponsibility. Unfortunately, the Church is not an exception. Often, it has spoken where it should have remained silent. And, often, it remained silent where it should have spoken. I'm not referring here to the Church's engagement ad extra, with the external world, although what I am saying is also applicable to this realm. Often, the Church could have been more vociferous in its fight for justice, in its defence of the poor, but chose to keep its mouth shut. On the other hand, often the Church should have been more prudent, but chose to speak and speak too much. Sadly, this is all true. However, I wish to focus on the Church's engagement ad intra, with itself and the different realities that constitute it. I wish to focus on the culture of silence in the Church, on those internal problems about which the Church should have spoken but chose, because it was convenient, to remain silent. There are problems, issues, within the Church about which we choose to remain silent rather than speaking. The clearest example which comes to everyone's mind is the sexual abuse crisis that the Church went through and is still going through. Unfortunately, this is not the only instance of a problem in the Church about which we choose to remain silent. What about the general silence concerning the deep divisions within the Catholic church? Between conservatives and liberals? Between those who exclusively want the ordinary form and those who want the extraordinary form? What about the political divisions in the Church? What about the divisions between the local Churches in the global west and the local Churches in the global south? What about the continuous struggle to make the priesthood of the baptised work hand in hand with sacramental priesthood? What about the role of women in the Church? How can one explain we have Catholics who want to exclude certain categories from our pews? These are all issues in the Church about which we rarely have a frank and open discussion. These are issues which we all acknowledge to be present but about which we prefer to remain silent. Or, even worse, choose to raise these issues within smaller groups made up of people having a common opinion. Rather than having an open, frank discussion, we end up in a Church made up of cliques. Rather than dialogue, we have a culture of us against them. The Church should speak about these issues, but often chooses to remain silent. -- An excerpt from a homily Cardinal Mario Grech, Secretary General of the Synod of Bishops, gave at a conference on Synodality at Oxford in March. Click here to read the full homily.

News&Notes

Archbishop Costelloe to lead Bishops Conference Plenary Council president Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB has been elected president of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference at its biannual meeting. Archbishop Costelloe, who was appointed president of the Plenary Council in 2018, will take on the Conference role in mid-July -- after the Council's second assembly. “As we continue to contemplate how we live out the Gospel in this age, including through the Plenary Council, I look forward to working with my brother bishops and the People of God to carry forward Christ’s mission,” Archbishop Costelloe said. Archbishop Costelloe paid tribute to Archbishop Mark Coleridge, who had served as Bishops Conference president for four years. “Archbishop Coleridge has been a calm and considered leader locally and in the global Church and will be a trusted adviser for me in this new role,” he said. Sydney Archbishop Anthony Fisher OP was re-elected vice-president of the Bishops Conference. Click here to read more.

Motions framework due out next week The motions that will be considered by the Plenary Council's 277 Members will be published in early June, providing the framework for the work of the second general assembly. The motions emerge from four years of listening, dialogue, discernment, prayer and reflection, emanating from the question "What do you think God is asking of us in Australia at the time?", which was the Council's foundational question. In the Listening and Discernment phase, there was a focus on becoming a more "Christ-centred Church". Watch the Plenary Council website or make sure you are subscribed to CathNews to be notified when the motions are published next week.

Food for the Journey -- Fr Frank Moloney SDB

Plenary Council advisers provide expert insights A key group involved in the work of the Plenary Council is the advisers. The advisers are people with particular knowledge and expertise across a range of matters, such as theology, Scripture, governance, formation and ecclesiology (study of the Church). The advisers can be called upon by members, individually or collectively, to provide advice on particular matters to assist with their discernment and decision-making. Advisers are sometimes called “experts” or “periti”, a Latin term used to describe the experts at the Second Vatican Council and other major Church events. Some advisers are providing reflections on their areas of expertise for Members of the Plenary Council and the wider Catholic community. The first of those videos, featuring renowned Scripture scholar Fr Frank Moloney SDB, has just been posted online. More videos will be added to the series, titled "Food for the Journey", in coming weeks. They can also be found on the Plenary Council website.

Turn to prayer in "troubled times", Archbishop urges Brisbane Archbishop Mark Coleridge has used the feast day of Our Lady, Help of Christians to call for prayers for the Church in Australia, ahead of the historic second assembly of the Plenary Council in Sydney in July. Archbishop Coleridge said the Church found itself in “troubled times” and needed “new life”. “It’s not a bad moment to pray – for a new government coming to power, and the future fairly uncertain both nationally and internationally,” he said during a Mass for employees from Church agencies across Brisbane. Archbishop Coleridge said Mary “is not just the physical mother of Jesus, she is the woman who is the word of God”. “We turn to her (Mary) as Christians and say 'help us', because left to our own devices we look very, very unpromising,” he said.  “We find ourselves in the Church in this country troubled.” Click here to read more.

Evangelisation conference mixes online, face-to-face The Australian Bishops Commission for Evangelisation, Laity and Ministry will host a national online conference on evangelisation from October 20-22. The conference will promote understanding and explore practices of evangelisation in Australia through encounters with Christ, formation in discipleship and mission in the world. It seeks to encourage Catholics to carry forward the Church’s evangelising mission after the second assembly of the Fifth Plenary Council of Australia. Commission chair Archbishop Christopher Prowse said he was excited about the opportunities the conference would provide to explore the understanding, language and diversity of evangelisation in Australia, while supporting local dialogue and action. “Evangelisation begins with an encounter with Jesus Christ, is nurtured through discipleship in our worshipping communities and calls us all to be missionary in the world,” he said. “This responsibility is not just for those in leadership, but for all. “This conference for evangelisation will highlight the interconnection of the missionary call of each baptised person and dynamic faith communities in fulfilling the Church’s mission to evangelise. Local communities are encouraged to host gatherings to be a part of the conference dialogue.” Online content will be streamed to provide stimulus and conversation-starters for local gatherings. The hybrid event will allow more people to participate than would have happened with an event held in-person only, the organisers explain. Click here to find out more about the conference.

Dioceses invited to take part in global families event  While the 10th World Meeting of Families will take place in Rome next month, dioceses around the world will join in the celebrations with the theme "Family Love: A Vocation and a Path to Holiness." A number of families will represent the Church in Australia at the gathering in Rome from June 22-26, including families from Eastern Rite Churches. At home, resources have been prepared by the Life, Marriage and Family Network to help local celebrations. “This event presents a special occasion of prayer and worship offered for the support, healing and fortification of families and pro-family values,” said Bishop Richard Umbers, the Bishop Delegate for Marriage and Family Life. Resources can be found at: http://www.family.catholic.org.au/ Click here to access a prayer for the World Meeting of Families.

Stay connected to the Council journey A great way to reconnect with or enter more deeply into the Plenary Council journey is to read some of the key documents from the past four years. They capture how far the People of God in Australia have travelled in that time. Documents you might wish to read again -- or read for the first time -- include: Listen to What the Spirit is Saying -- the final report from the initial Listening and Dialogue phase of the Council; Continuing the Journey -- the instrumentum laboris (working document) for the Council, published in mid-2021; First Assembly Proposals from Small Groups and Individuals -- often referred to as the "Fruits of the First Assembly", published in December 2021. You can find other key documents, including the six Thematic Discernment Papers, on the Plenary Council website. The motions framework for the second assembly will also be posted to that page.

Follow us online The Plenary Council is active online. You can like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter and subscribe to our YouTube channel.

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Bay and Basin Swimmers excel at Australian Para and Age Swimming Championships -Shoalhaven City Council - Media Release

 

26 May 2022

Bay and Basin swimming club members Jasmine Greenwood and Talika Irvine have both achieved outstanding results at the recent Para and Age swimming championships held in Adelaide. 

Jasmine achieved a top-three finish in all four events and
in doing so has gained selection to the Australian Swimming Team to compete at the World Para Swimming Championships held in Portugal later this year. Her results also gained her selection to represent Australia at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in England.  

 L-R: Talika Irvine, Head Coach Stephen Alderman and Jasmine Greenwood

Talika competed in five events, placing 5th in the 400m medley and 6th in the 200m medley and was the 1st NSW swimmer in both events. Talika's performances now put her in contention for selection for NSW Swimming’s performance squads and teams.   

Shoalhaven City Council Mayor Amanda Findley said, “I’d like to congratulate Jasmine and Talika on their outstanding swimming achievements.”  

“Their results demonstrate a commitment to training and passion for the sport. They should both be very proud of their hard work.”  

“On behalf of the Shoalhaven community I’d like to wish them both the very best for their next competition”, said Mayor Findley. 

Both Jasmine and Talika train at the Bay and Basin Leisure Centre under Head Coach Stephen Alderman. Squad training is available at five of Council’s swim facilities and is a great way to develop swimming skills beyond the basics and into the competitive side of the sport.  

Learn more at Shoalhaven Swim Sport and Fitness.   

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Albo brings in wage Increases which increases inflation and many more surprises!

Although the election has finished yesterday, if only how voting finished in the Seat of Gilmore transferred across the nation, the results could have been closer.

It's actually exciting living in a swinging Federal seat, just speaking to one person may swing the votes of others.

It appears that Gilmore will be won by high profile Liberal Party Candidate, Andrew Constance, by a slim majority, with postal votes to be counted So for him to retain his seat next, he would need to really get out to the community and get his policies out there. With a first preference swing of 13.23%, he is currently at 2 party-preferred, he requires a .28% swing to win the seat. 

Now Albo has won from Scomo, are we going to face huge Reserve Bank Board interest rates, which raises Home loan interest rates a rise in the unemployed from 3.9% a rise raising all wages - which creates rises in inflation. Will he bring in the  National Integrity Commission (aka known as NIC), which will go back 15 years of Parliament and review the tactics of his frontbenchers?  At least one of them  Christina Kenneally, will not be on the front bench. I remember my mother tried to approach her at their local parish and she snubbed her off and spoke to the press, waiting outside the church instead.

Climate change targets may be introduced, which will bring in a new tax. The Homeloan lending scheme from the government will bring 'a hidden tax' - a tax where when you sell your property you will repay the Australian government extra.

If Albo has a minority government pending on 10-12 independents, I will be able to predict an early election within 12-18 months. Minority governments, do not usually do well!

Now, when we come to the minor parties even those that are independents are backed up by Billionaires to oust the government. They are not true independents. These members of Parliament may be acting like puppets for this billionaire. They are called the TEAL Independents, supported by the same financial backer, clean enegery Simon Homes a Court, and his political group Climate 200. He is funding these candidates who are only looking at 2 policies a full federal Integrity Commission and tackling Climate Change. What they do after that, who knows?

They are called the Teal independents as they have campaign material in the blue-green colour of 'teal'.

Then, we have The Greens, which have run for quite a few elections, gaining momentum at each election. They are the 2nd Labor Party Team -  both parties swap preferences with each other, generally

Then we have Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party, which is always looking to retain Australia as traditional Australia we should be.

There is the
United Australia Party - which has been shying votes away from Liberals and Labor for the last couple of elections.

Now, from here on in all Federal parties should be pre-selecting for the next Federal Election, candidates to run in seats not elected and be known as 'Shadow Members'. By doing this we get to know the candidate way before the election is held. I remember a former Mayor of Waverley had shadow Councillors, getting candidates ready for a bi-election or election