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For this issue, we remember two great intellects, Cardinal Patrick Moran and James McAuley.Back in 2006, Connor Court published the new edition of The Heart of James McAuley by Peter Coleman. For the launch of the James McAuley book, the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) with John Roskam, held what we at Connor Court remember as one of our best book launches. The speakers on the night, included the Hon Tony Staley, the Hon Tony Abbott and Peter Coleman AO. Thanks to the IPA, the speeches of all three speakers were faithfully transcribed at the time and published on the IPA webpage. So here, thanks to the IPA, are the speeches of the book launch, which rightfully honours the great intellect, James McAuley.The first half of the quarterly is a controversial paper given back in 1901 by Cardinal Patrick Moran to the Royal Geographical Society of Australia (RGS) entitled: 'Was Australia Discovered by De Quiros in the Year 1606?' Here Cardinal Moran boldly argues the case that the first Europeans on the East Coast of Australia were in fact, back in 1606 the Portuguese explorer Pedro Fernandes de Quirós. It was a bold claim, largely dismissed by RGS and many historians since. But what if, there is some substance to the claim. The paper is well argued and could be an excellent launching-pad for the Gladstone region in Queensland to claim their own version of Botany Bay. We have preserved the original scans of the pamphlet, without any editorial additions. It is our hope this work can create further articles on the topic on who were the first Europeans to visit Australia's east-coast.

With a Foreword by Hon Andrew Rob MP and contributions from: Mike Adams, Nicolas Brown, Peter Collens, John Dawkins, Greg Dodds, Leith Doody, Pat Evans, Ralph Evans, Tim Fischer, Richard Fletcher, Bruce Gosper, Terry Goss, Tim Harcourt, Roger James, Greg Joffe, Peter Langhorne, Lucy Luo, Bruno Mascitelli, Elizabeth Masamune, Bruce Nicholls, Phil Ruthven, Laurie Smith, Geoff Spears, John Tinney, Petr Vodvarka, Peter Wilton and Ian Wing. Bruno Mascitelli is Associate Professor at Swinburne University of Technology. Between 1982 and 1997 Bruno was employed by Austrade as a local employed staff in the Milan (Italy) office. He joined academia in 2000 and has since then published widely in the area of international business, migration and the Italian diaspora.

It is certainly self-evident that sound principles are needed to help guide better understanding and public policy making going forward. The Ten Principles of Regulation and Reform, to be discussed at length in the coming pages, therefore is such a guide, where each of the following chapters is broadly structured as follows: - What is this principle exactly?- Why is this principle important?- How is this principle applied?

Since I'm first and foremost a public finance economist, I'll share one of my favorite tactics when debating fiscal policy. I'll oftentimes share a table showing a list of nations that have achieved very good results by restraining the growth of government spending. I'll show how the burden of government spending declined as a share of economic output and I'll show how budget deficits also shrank as a share of GDP. I'll then ask my colleague from the other side to please share a list of nations that got good results by raising taxes. Unsurprisingly, the usual response is either untrue claims or hemming and hawing. When seeking to educate and convince a non-ideological audience that they should favor economic freedom, I've learned that there's no substitute for this kind of real-world evidence. Most people think of themselves as being practical. My daily columns are designed to reach these people. If I can reach their minds, maybe their hearts will follow. -- From the Introduction

Extracts from the Conclusions: ...The book also tracks the modern day religious descendants of the first Christian converts -Jews, indigenous Aramaic and Coptic speaking gentiles, and even the Greek (Antiochian/Melkite) colonists living in the Middle East... In the seventh Christian century, tensions between Rome and Constantinople and private treaties between Byzantine emperors and the newly emerged Arab Muslim caliphs suggest how the Middle East's religious make-up, as the world's heartland of Christianity, was to be considerably altered into the future.... The culture of Aramaic Catholics in the medieval period points to many ongoing influences on the architecture, dress and customs of Western Christianity and Islamic society. Examples are provided such as the succession of Maronite popes in Rome, Western hospital emblems, the Muslim hijab and the minaret tower of mosques. Extract from foreword of Professor Carole Cusack, Department of Studies in Religion, The University of Sydney: "...This book...merits a wide readership ...and has significance and power for Christians around the world. Peter El Khouri deserves commendation for his patient and careful analysis of a far more diverse Christianity than most Australians in the twenty-first century have ever heard of. I am delighted to warmly recommend this book".

The context for Biemans' work is the development of law and practice on abortion in the United Kingdom and The Netherlands. The choice of these two countries is apposite. The UK (with the exception of Northern Ireland) was one of the earliest western countries to legalise abortion and the UK law provided a template for many other countries with similar legal frameworks, most particularly across the Commonwealth. Whether or not the reality matches the theory, the Netherlands has come to be seen as the ultimate liberal country in which abortion is (relatively) rare but almost always legal. Thankfully, the Western European context provides a basis for a much more complete discussion of the issues and arguments surrounding abortion which will be of immense value right across the world. Biemans draws together insights from the fields of medicine, economics, psychology, politics, law, theology and ethics. He engages effectively with the most recent empirical work on the practical impact of abortion law and uses this to provide fresh insight into the key ethical debates. Integrating such disparate fields is no easy task and it is to his great credit that he has managed to find a balance between rigor and accessibility which will enable this work to be of use to a broad range of users. The importance of caring for both the mother and baby have been understood and put into practice by the pro-life movement for many years, as has the recognition that women need care and reconciliation rather than condemnation after abortion. This understanding is central to Biemans' work, as is his conclusion that rights and needs of the mother and the unborn baby are not only of paramount importance but complementary to each other rather than in opposition. Given Biemans' understanding of theology and Church history, this volume will surely become a standard source of reference within Catholic institutions. However, I am confident its reach will be much greater than that. The approach is balanced and scholarly, but it is hard for the reader to avoid the conclusion that the right to life of the unborn, the rights of women and the social consequences of abortion should not be seen as standing in opposition to each other and requiring of compromise. Rather, laws which protect the vulnerable unborn, also protect mothers and society as a whole. Of course this has been the wisdom of the Catholic Church for centuries, but it is wonderful to see such a clear-sighted presentation of the logic and evidence in their entirety.

from the introduction... We have written this book because we believe in 'traditional' marriage and wish to see it protected. But who are we? We are two unmarried men from very different backgrounds. John is the second of eleven children and his parents remain happily married after thirty-three years. Jeremy is the eldest of two children, whose parents separated when he was nine and later divorced. John was raised Catholic and, despite a rocky patch in his early twenties, he has never abandoned his faith. Jeremy was not raised in any faith tradition and for some years was strongly anti-Christian. For most of his twenties he also considered himself exclusively homosexual, and for nearly five years he was in a relationship with another man. After many years of having no faith at all, he became a Catholic in his early thirties. You might have expected us to end up on opposite sides of the marriage debate, given our vastly different upbringings and life-experiences. Yet we did not. Although both of us are now practising Catholics, this is not a religious book. It so happens that, when each of us first thought seriously about the subject of marriage, religion barely came into it. John was at rock bottom career-wise, emotionally and spiritually, though still a believer. Jeremy was not even a believer. He had recently broken up with his partner, but had hopes of getting back together with him. He and his ex-partner had even talked of getting married. Nonetheless, his reflections on marriage led him in the same direction as John: towards the 'traditional' (one man, one woman) view of marriage. This book is our attempt to explain why.

The Way of Jesus offers fresh insights into the relevance of the Beatitudes for our lives. It inspires us to live with the heart of Jesus, and challenges us to go beyond ourselves in being genuine disciples in an increasingly complex world. -- From the Foreword, Most Rev Christopher Prowse, Archbishop of Canberra and Goulburn

It's easy to be gloomy about the future prospects for the tropical jungles of Southeast Asia. This book takes a constructive look at jungle conservation, arguing that implementing economic measures that value jungle trees is the way to sustain them and their biological values. The central thesis of the book is the need to inject a dose of economic realism into a subject that has been long on superlatives and emotion, but short on commercial reality. The book sets out an argument for the management of tropical jungles founded on an economic case that in part lies in the increasing prospects of sustainable, legally verified wood production and climate change abatement carbon credit trading. It also advocates that making trees too valuable to destroy is a critical piece of the jungle survival puzzle. It advances an argument for developing economic incentives to retain healthy, functioning, viable jungle ecosystems across Southeast Asia. Such a prescription will help to create a set of circumstances where tropical jungles are seen as economic assets, not liabilities, and where governments, corporations and local communities have a vested interest in keeping trees standing. This is author John Halkett's fifth tree related book. He runs a forest consultancy business in Sydney, Australia and has expertise in temperate and tropical forest management and forest based industries. John also serves on the Board of the Global Timber Forum. He has held senior positions in government forest and conservation agencies in Australia and New Zealand. John has also worked in the United States, Canada, Papua New Guinea, across Southeast Asia, Myanmar, China and Africa. In addition to his books he has written numerous scientific papers and writes for trade publications.

C. Barkley's little manual on rat catching (and rabbit catching) is from a past era when life was much simpler and our propensity to call a pest a pest was not diminished by the selective fads and niceties of modernity. Most important of all, it was an era when the Aristotelian idea of ends - the proper conduct of a life towards a desired conclusion - was of importance not just for humans, but for all living things. It was proper and ordained for rats to live rat-centred lives, doing the things rats do, just as it was proper for ferrets to do the things that come natural to them. And, as Barkley himself indicates in his Introduction, it was ordained in the great scheme of things that dogs should come to their human masters and not the other way round, for this, too, represents a natural order in the hierarchy of being. It was proper also, that each human occupation should be regarded as having an intrinsic worth and the value of the trade of rat-catching should be seen in no less a light than that of any other profession. Indeed, as Barkley hints in the book, the value of a rat-catcher might well be regarded in a higher light than that of your average politician who, as Barkley reminds us, is prone to giving speeches when Parliament is not sitting or, indeed, at every possible opportunity! And this, as Barkley tells us, is why he decided on a school text book for prospective rat catchers.

A biography of the Democratic Labor Party's first Parliamentary Leader.

Drawing on his extensive overseas and Australian experience of parish life, Fr James Grant shows that, despite rising secularism and religious apathy in the West, there is no need for priests and parishioners to accept an inevitable decline in parish life and activity. His key insight is that churches have to move with the time while staying true to their core beliefs. This does not mean reading the zeitgeist of passing fashions or pursuing political causes from the pulpit. Many traditional faith brands such as Methodism and Presbyterianism have virtually disappeared, while erstwhile pillars of yesteryear, such as the Anglican Church, are rapidly withering on the vine. By trying to blend political causes with religious beliefs they have only succeeded in confusing their lifetime supporters, while failing to persuade activists to come on board. Activists may be passionate about their pet causes, but they don't need to do so within a church framework. The Catholic Church has over a billion adherents worldwide and is still expanding in many countries - not because it bends with the political wind but because it stays true to its long held beliefs. Even those who don't strictly follow its teachings on such subjects as contraception and divorce can still admire its consistency of purpose and high principles. After all, its basic message of primacy for the poor and disadvantaged is a timeless and peerless one, which first captured hearts and minds nearly two thousand years ago. The bulwark of modern society has always been the family and family values, but what has previously been taken for granted is now under vigorous assault. Marriage is becoming an optional extra for many, while its definition is undergoing profound re-thinking. But a multitude of studies have shown that those who have settled family lives are much more likely to achieve both material and spiritual prosperity, as well as a greater degree of happiness and life satisfaction. Father Grant gives many practical examples of what a forward thinking but traditional values based programme can achieve. Those who already attend church are almost, by definition, amenable to an offer of further spiritual uplift and would be willing to contribute to community and parish life in various ways, if they can see an active agenda. Those who have turned away or are still looking for something to fill the spiritual hunger gap would be attracted by a parish priest and council which is keen to engage them on issues of mutual concern, whether pastoral or charitable. Care and compassion and concern for the poor should be core business for churches. So a programme which marries the traditional values and teaching of the gospel with the busy lives of ordinary people should have widespread appeal. Fr Grant shows that this can, indeed must, be done if the Catholic Church is to remain vibrant and relevant to the lives of ordinary Australians.

Digital disruption is transforming the marketplace and improving our lives in ways we never imagined. But by comparison government services seem clunky, sluggish and slipshod. Angus Taylor says it is time governments caught up. The transformative power of digital technology can disrupt traditional lacklustre public services, redefine regulation and make governments more efficient, open and accountable. Crucially digital innovation puts the citizen back at the centre of the modern state in line with fundamental liberal and conservative principles. Series Editor: Nick Cater

From its inception, s 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (Cth) has been controversial. This law makes unlawful any act reasonably likely to offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate another person or group of people because of their race, colour, nationality or ethnicity. Serious concerns have been raised about s 18C's effect on freedom of expression. In this book, the authors argue that s 18C is too broad and too vague to be constitutional. They argue that relevant international treaties do not support the sweeping scope of s 18C. Further, they argue that s 18C's breadth and complexity impermissibly infringes the freedom of communication about government and political matters implied from the Commonwealth Constitution. In the course of their argument, the authors also cover issues relevant to Australia's common law legal tradition and liberal democratic heritage. This book makes a timely contribution to the fight for freedom of expression in Australia. Joshua Forrester: BA (Hons) (Murd), LLB (Hons) (UWA), PhD Candidate (Murdoch). Lorraine Finlay: BA (UWA), LLB (UWA), LLM (NUS), LLM (NYU), Lecturer in Constitutional Law, Murdoch Law School. Augusto Zimmermann: LLB (Hons), LLM cum laude, PhD (Mon) Senior Lecturer in Constitutional Law and Legal Theory, Murdoch Law School; Law Reform Commissioner, Law Reform Commission of Western Australia; Professor of Law (adjunct), University of Notre Dame Australia, Sydney.

All Catholics must accept Catholic social teaching with religious submission of mind and will; Laudato Si' summarises Catholic social teaching where environmental and related issues are concerned; Laudato Si' applies Catholic social teaching to the current state of the environment as perceived by Pope Francis; The Pope's description of the state of the environment is open to debate; On climate change the Pope opts for and heavily promotes the "consensus" account of the science without referenced justification and does not refer to any other view; The Catholic Church lacks the competence to resolve continuing scientific debates; The debate over anthropogenic global warming is far from complete; Laudato Si', Pope Francis' Encyclical Letter On the Care of Our Common Home, repeatedly calls for a "forthright and honest debate" (nn. 16, 61, 135, 138, 188); The present author takes no "side" in the debate about climate change and wants the debate to continue, but in a context which provides for a much fairer hearing to be given to all sides to that debate; This book as a part of the Living Ethics Series is intended as a contribution to that "forthright and honest debate" on environmental issues generally for which the Pope calls.

It is impossible to make sense of modern Australia without understanding the achievements of Sir Robert Menzies. Half a century after Menzies left the Lodge, this timely work invites us to think again about the Menzies legacy and the enduring influence of his Liberal philosophy.

This project started on 27 December 2014, after I read the horrible news that a mother had murdered seven of her children and one other child. The dead numbered three of the mother's girls, aged 12, 11 and 2; four of her boys aged 9, 8, 6 and 5. The eighth victim, a 14-year-old niece, had been staying with them in their Cairns home. The woman had these children to four different fathers. Her income came from you and me, taxpayers. Did anyone ever think to call a halt to this women being used as a cash cow?

Fascinating reminiscences from Rome open this third volume of Gerald O'Collins' memoirs: stories about Mother Teresa and her beatification, Mel Gibson when filming The Passion of Christ, John Wilkins and the investigation of Jacques Dupuis, a Vatican conference on male impotence, and Richard Hammond and Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code. After a chapter on Joseph Ratzinger as cardinal and pope, O'Collins moves to the busy years when he took up a research post at St Mary's College (now St Mary's University), Twickenham (2006-2009). Gripping stories about Tony Blair, Lord Hailsham, Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor, and others (including the IRA revolutionary Rose Dugdale) pack these pages. On returning to Australia, O'Collins took up residence between Royal Park and Royal Parade, Melbourne, but has continued to lecture at conferences overseas. A Templeton Foundation meeting took him as far as Hamlet's castle in Elsinore. The background to his steady flow of books, including a response to Philip Pullman's The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ, will enthral readers. Nine appendices enrich this volume- not least the page-turning obituaries of Cardinal Dulles, Cardinal Martini, and the Prince and Princess Doria Pamphij.

Why are the most vulnerable children in Australia abused and neglected in plain sight of the child welfare authorities supposed to protect them? The over-emphasis placed on 'family preservation' at almost all costs keeps exposing children to prolonged - and sometimes fatal - maltreatment by highly-damaged parents...who damage their children. When finally removed as a last resort, children are further damaged by highly unstable foster care and repeat breakdowns of family reunifications. The Madness of Australian Child Protection analyses the ideological, institutional and cultural factors that impede efforts to ensure priority is given to children's rights instead of the 'rights' of dysfunctional parents. In this passionate account of a flawed system, Sammut argues that the perpetual crisis besetting child protection regimes nation-wide will not end until the taboo on the use of adoption is broken.

The book you are about to read provides a new paradigm for understanding the ministry of a twelfth-century cloistered Benedictine nun, St Hildegard of Bingen, the fourth woman doctor of the Church in light of twenty-first century servant leadership. Christine Cameron reveals to us the role of the servant leader as defined by Larry C. Spears (1998). She demonstrates how St Hildegard embodies each of the ten characteristics presented by Spears: listening, empathy, healing, awareness, persuasion, conceptualisation, foresight, stewardship, commitment to the growth of people, and building community. By examining the saint's life and writings, Cameron places Hildegard in the company of twenty-first century religious, educational and corporate leaders who shape and guide our own journeys. She then compares St Hildegard's servant leadership to that of the other three women doctors of the Church: St Teresa of Ávila, St Catherine of Siena and St Thérèse of Lisieux, whose theological teachings were deemed to have lasting value for all time, not just for the times in which they lived. - From the Foreword, Linn Maxwell Keller

In 1986 there was a nuclear disaster at Chernobyl, in what was then the Soviet Union. The area, over two thousand square kilometres, was evacuated and sealed, closed off from the world by a massive wall. But 149 schoolkids are left behind, forgotten. Over time, they learn how to survive, and slowly they build a society for themselves despite the dangers - radiation, wolves, and winter - of the Zone. Twenty years after the Evacuation, a helicopter from the other side of the Wall appears, with a mysterious woman at the controls. That encounter sparks a chain of events which takes one of the Children, the hunter Isaak, back to the past, to the day of the Evacuation - and towards a confrontation which threatens the future of the Zone itself. Derek Parker is a freelance writer based in Melbourne. His non-fiction writing appears in a wide range of publications. He has two children and two cats. Children of Zone is his second novel, after This Tattooed Land.

EDITORIAL - Brian Coman * CHRISTIANITY AND FEMINISM - Philippa Martyr * HOW TO MAKE A BAD ANALOGY - Jonathan Ratcliffe and Chris Heggie-Brown * DEATH OF THE WORD - Tom McWilliam * WORDSWORTH, KEATS AND THE MODERN: PART ONE - Maurice Nestor * ON AUTOMATION - A PHILOSOPHY TUTORIAL - Roger Sworder * CHINA AND JAPAN - SOME APHORISMS - Clive Faust

Photographer James P Campbell led an adventurous, creative life. Much of his work has gone unnoticed or has not been attributed to him. During a career stretching from the 1890s to the 1930s he was present with his camera at a number of important events in Australian and world history, some of which are still in the news today. He bicycled through the Victorian Alps capturing its scenic delights, produced images to promote Australia abroad, photographed the everyday activities of soldiers on Gallipoli, recorded the involvement of the Australian Light Horse in the Middle East, and documented the growth of the SEC and Yallourn under Sir John Monash. He pursued photography as art, often to his own detriment. The resultant portfolio of images can be found in public and private collections throughout Australia and no doubt beyond. This is the story of Campbell's life and substantial photographic legacy. Alan Harding grew up on a small dairy farm in the Latrobe Valley, He has completed a Bachelor of Arts degree at the Gippsland Institute of Advanced Education, Churchill (later Monash, now Federation University), majoring in sociology, but acquiring a lasting interest in Australian history and literature. After eighteen years employed as a public servant with the Commonwealth Employment Service in Morwell, Lalor and Seymour, he wrote a history of Toongabbie, Victoria. He then returned to study, completing a doctorate by research as an external student of Monash University, Gippsland, on a biography of photographer JP Campbell.

The son of two Federal Liberal Ministers, Campbell Newman has been an army major, a high-flying management consultant, Lord Mayor of Australia's largest council and Premier of Queensland. For the first time in this authorised biography, his incredible and often controversial story is revealed in remarkable detail and scope. The biography also merges Campbell's story with a broader discussion on the future of reform in Australia, as told to the author by some of the nation's most prominent former and current politicians, business people and Campbell himself.

Authority encroaching on the human desire for liberty, happiness and fulfilment in life is often perceived as interfering with individual human rights. Such criticism has always attached to the Catholic Church, an authoritarian institution with, some say, little or no understanding of modern human life. Rather than producing the invigorated Church relevant to the new millennium envisaged and intended, the fifty years following the Second Vatican Council have been marred by factional divisions serving self interests and on-going demands for reform and renewal, often in blatant disregard for Papal authority and Church moral teaching. The controversies and confusions which drive the demands for renewal and reform arise in the main from disagreement with Catholic teaching on matters of human life morality embracing issues such as contraception, abortion, euthanasia, life creating technologies such as cloning and in-vitro fertilisation (IVF), human sexuality, marriage and family, ordination to priesthood and some aspects of feminism. From a Catholic moral perspective, this book seeks to engender understanding and to dispel confusion in the discussion of these controversial issues by outlining what the Church teaches on human life, why it does so and what the Second Vatican Council documents proclaim on these matters.