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Letter to the Editor of The AustralianSr Patty Fawkner sent the following Letter to the Editor of The Australian on 31 August 2004:Peter Shadbolt's article, Catholic Church 'driving youth out', (27 August 2004) concerns ideas and statements of Father Frank Brennan SJ in an address to a recent Catholic Secondary Education Conference. The article is flawed on many counts. It takes Father Brennan's statement out of context. It conflates and confuses several different issues and contains many inaccuracies. Father Brennan is not the Director of the Jesuit Social Justice Centre, nor is Father Bill Uren the Jesuit provincial. More substantively, Father Brennan did not say that 'young people are being turned off the priesthood by an increasingly autocratic and doctrinaire Catholic Church', nor does he describe his difference of perspective with Cardinal George Pell in terms of a 'battle' or 'war'. Rather, he expresses his willingness to discern, to dialogue, to understand various perspectives in the church on important issues, such as the primacy of conscience. This is not the stuff of 'deep fissure in the church' nor open criticism of Dr Pell as Peter Shadbolt would have us believe. The original text of Father Brennan's address can be read at www.uniya.org. Sr Patty Fawkner SGS, Director of Uniya Jesuit Social Justice Centre, Kings Cross, NSW
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