Our thinking Archives - Page 29 of 34 - Jesuit Social Services

We stand with refugees
- 9 June 2017
The ultimate solution to the issue of refugees is to deal with the causes such as wars, persecution and poverty, writes Jesuit Social Services Board member LIBBY ROGERSON. Despite the protestations of some nations and the evasion of others there is really no escaping the fact that the care and protection of refugees is a…
World Environment Day: if we exploit the environment, we damage ourselves
- 4 June 2017
On World Environment Day, ANDY HAMILTON SJ urges us to remember we are part of the environment. World Environment Day (5 June 2017) this year comes into fluky winds. The strident public debate about the reality of global warming and the threat it poses to the world has died down. Few knowledgeable people deny its…
Standing apart: the gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Youth
- 25 May 2017
Policy team volunteer DARCY TILBROOK urges equal opportunities for Aboriginal Australians in this blog for Sorry Day (26 May). The blog was adapted from a speech he gave at the 2016-17 Rotary Australia Four Way Test Speaking Competition. Imagine a school boy standing in front of you. Let’s call him James. A white, 16-year-old school…
Sorry Day calls for cultural recognition and respect of Indigenous Australians
- 24 May 2017
Rising Indigenous incarceration rates suggest the promises made in Kevin Rudd’s Apology to Indigenous Australians haven’t been met, writes ANDY HAMILTON SJ. Sorry Day (26 May) is worth remembering in our present anxious times. In 2008, the Apology made by the then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd acknowledging wrongs done, was supported by both sides of…
Upholding the rights of children and young people in youth justice
- 16 May 2017
Policy team volunteer JEMIMA HOFFMAN writes about the denial of rights of children and young people in the youth justice system, drawing on the work of experts who participated in our recent National Justice Symposium. Abuse is not foreign to youth justice in Australia. But can our failures be rectified with reforms, or are they endemic…
International Day of Families
- 15 May 2017
Why are families important, and when are they most effective? ANDY HAMILTON SJ champions the extended family in this blog for UN International Day of Families. Public celebrations of family life such as the International Day of Families (15 May) should be uncontroversial. But they sometimes focus on the definition of the family, with the…
On being discerning - by Andy Hamilton SJ
- 4 May 2017
In the final blog from our organisational values series, ANDY HAMILTON SJ brings discernment down to earth. Discerning has an up-market ring to it. We imagine a discerning person as one who has the money to buy and drink expensive wine, or one who goes to only the best reviewed movies. But as a way…
More than the sum of their crimes: listening to the voices of young people
- 2 May 2017
Policy team volunteer DARCY TILBROOK advocates for a more rounded view of young offenders. He draws on Jesuit Social Services’ recent conversation about how politics, media and public opinion shape youth justice in Australia. How young offenders are viewed by society is heavily influenced by the media. The language used and the stories told often…
Investments into addressing youth remand numbers will ease pressure on system
- 24 April 2017
As public concern has risen over community safety in Victoria, so too has the number of young people held on remand in the state. In late 2016, before an incident at Parkville Youth Detention Centre that resulted in part of the facility being shut down and a number of young people being transferred to the…
Anzac Day is a chance to imagine living, not dying, for democracy
- 24 April 2017
Rather than asking what cause people died for, we should ask what we’re prepared to live for, says ANDY HAMILTON. In this blog, he shows how linking soldiers’ deaths to a broader cause diminishes people’s intrinsic value. Image: Pixabay At Anzac Day it’s common to set the deaths of the soldiers at Gallipoli into the…