The COVID-19 pandemic brought a hard lockdown for the 500 person Arrernte community of Santa Teresa in Central Australia, with only essential services allowed in or out. But despite the devastating impact on the community’s economy and the challenges of living under such a lockdown, faith, love and the artistic skills for which Santa Teresa is known around the world have kept people focused on keeping safe and the promise of new life, writes Sr Liz Wiemers SGS in Global Sisters Report.

Australian Catholic Religious Against Trafficking in Humans (ACRATH) has developed a prayer and action resource to use in marking the 2020 World Day Against Trafficking in Persons on July 30.

Governments around the world are anxious to get their countries back to normal, writes Corrie van den Bosch MSS. But what is ‘normal’? Will getting back to ‘normal’ mean a continuation of neglect of the issue of climate change? So far this year Australia has seen catastrophic bushfires, followed by floods, followed by the pandemic. “We can mend it if we really wanted to”, the line from one of Joe Wise’s song from the 1980s, comes to mind. Our governments need to know that we really do want to mend the ways our current economic policies impact on life on Earth, that we want to set different priorities in which the health of the natural environment is number one. Human health depends on it.

I am playing with God. I don’t mean that in a frivolous, joking way, but rather, a childish, playful way, in that I am delighting in God’s creation, in the natural beauty that surrounds me, right where I am. I have risen early to walk up to a nearby beach. Thankfully during our time of COVID-19 isolation, we’ve been allowed to leave our homes for the purpose of exercise, writes Fiona Basile for IgnationSpirituality.com..

The Redemptorist, through Majellan Media, have extended their ministry to families with a new podcast aimed at supporting couples in difficult times.