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Philippa Martyr – Witness
The Future Catholic Church in Australia
Sunday 13th April starting 2:30 pm for 3:00 pm
IN CONVERSATION WITH PROFESSOR JAMES FRANKLIN
In this timely and important book, Philippa Martyr asks – and answers – a lot of painful questions about the Catholic Church’s future in Australia.
The Church in Australia is a mighty spiritual force that flows like a river, transforming lives and saving souls. But it’s also in real crisis.
Barely 400,000 people in Australia now go to Sunday Mass – less than the population of Tasmania. At the same time, billions of dollars pour annually through Catholic schools, hospitals, and charities.
Many young Australian Catholics now feel like unwanted strangers in their own Church. And yet soon, they will inherit what’s left of it.
Enriched by data sets, interviews, and commentary from across the Church, ‘Witness’ is both a sharp analysis of the real problems and a blueprint for younger Catholics to rebuild a future Church in Australia.
“Dorothy Day famously remarked that ‘although the Church may sometimes play the harlot, she will always be my mother’. Similarly, Philippa Martyr has painted an unvarnished ‘warts and all’ picture of the Church in Australia as it is in our time and her projections for the year 2050. Like the observations of Dorothy Day, the work is written from the perspective of a faithful Catholic who loves the Body of Christ but knows that she (the Church is always feminine) can do better. Her judgments are backed up by empirical evidence and her insights are both acute and relatable.” – Professor Tracey Rowland, University of Notre Dame
RSVPS ESSENTIAL
Dr Philippa Martyr lives in Perth WA where she is an adjunct Research Fellow, School of Philosophy and Theology, University of Notre Dame (Fremantle), and an External Affiliate, Benedict XVI Centre for Religion and Society, UNDA/St Mary’s University Twickenham, UK. She is also a regular columnist for Sydney’s The Catholic Weekly. She is a lifelong Catholic who likes to read, listen, write, and observe.
Professor James Franklin is no stranger to religious history or controversy in Australia. As well as his works on philosophy and mathematics, he has written about Catholic Action, Archbishop Mannix, the sexual abuse crisis, and Catholic social life and values in Australia. He is the editor of the Journal of the Australian Catholic Historical Society.
One of his fields of research is extreme risk theory, a concept that describes the possibility of rare but severe outcomes. This may or may not be associated with launching a book about the future of the Catholic Church on Palm Sunday.