About 5,000 Catholic school staff gathered in eight venues throughout the metropolitan area recently to prayerfully begin the new school year by celebrating the Eucharist together.

In a world of instant communication, the tragic and historic events occurring on the streets of Kyiv and in other Ukrainian cities are more immediate to non-Ukrainian Australians than ever. The antecedents of the horrifying events of this year and last, including the sniper killings of 100 protesters in Independence Square on February 20, are little understood by the populations of other Western countries, writes Dr Andrew Kania, but need to be grappled with if the fledgling country is ever to move forward and become again the place of great civilisation it has historically been.

Spearwood man, Chris De Sousa was a successful migration lawyer when he felt God’s call to pursue the religious life. On January 25, Mr De Sousa and four other Somascan novices made their profession in Somasca, Italy, making vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. The past year of formation has been the greatest of his life to date, he writes.

Pope Francis’ most frequent advice and exhortation to Catholics — from laypeople in parishes to bishops and cardinals — is “Go forth.” In Italian, the phrase is even snappier: “Avanti.”

A small sign — a sheet of paper printed from a computer — announces “We’re now open” on the front door of Matthew’s Meat Shop on Real Street, across from some of the most devastated communities in this typhoon-ravaged city.

From the moment Pope Francis, dressed simply in a white cassock, stepped out on the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica for the first time and bowed, he signaled his pontificate would bring some style differences to the papacy.

Preparing for the Year for Consecrated Life, members of religious orders, secular institutes and consecrated virgins are asked to spend a considerable amount of time remembering the joy they felt when they first realized God was calling them.

Pope Francis said bishops should act not like ambitious corporate executives, but humble evangelists and men of prayer, willing to sacrifice everything for their flocks.

As protests in Venezuela continued, with flare-ups of violence, the country’s Catholic leaders urged dialogue and respect for the demonstrators’ human rights.

Just because many Catholics do not understand the church’s teaching about the indissolubility of marriage, that does not mean the church can change that teaching, said Cardinal Gerhard Muller, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.