Make a Difference

Day: March 29, 2009

Dud Priest Continues to Damage the Church

It is hard to see how rebel catholic priest Peter Kennedy can believe he is doing the right thing. For years he has refused to teach the catholic faith, offering instead his own version of easy to digest do-it-yourself Christianity mixed with popular psychology. He has refused to accept guidance about why what he is doing is wrong, and refused to stand aside so that the people of his parish could have what they are entitled to – a priest who will teach and live the faith.

Now after reaching a mediation with church authorities which will see him replaced at St Mary’s South Brisbane, he has announced he intends to set up a church of his own (and that’s what it will be, his church, not Christ’s church) only a few hundred metres away.

A priest is supposed to be a father to his congregation, is supposed to protect and care for them, is supposed to teach them the faith so that they may be nurtured and grow in Christ. He is entrusted, and this is a solemn trust which ought to make every clergyman tremble, with the spiritual well-being of his people.

Clergy have crises of faith all the time. Occasionally clergy go off the rails. Very occasionally a priest will lose his faith completely. Clergy are human. As I have said before, I do not object to someone believing something other than the catholic faith (though I think they are losing out if they do).

The problem here is that Peter Kennedy is instead insisting on his ‘right’ to teach the people of St Mary’s South Brisbane his own philosophy, which seems to be a bizarre collection of every currently trendy notion, while telling them that this is the catholic faith. This is simply dishonest.

His beliefs are not the issue. His integrity is – if he had any, he would have left long ago.

Microsoft puts Bounty on Conficker Worm Creators

The Conficker Worm itself does not seem to do much harm. It’s just a competent piece of programming which is hard to detect, and which so far, seems not to be malicious. It sounds to me like the work of a couple of smarty-pants but good-natured high-schoolers. It will modify itself on Wednesday to make its masters harder to find.

People with genuine copies of Windows who get automatic updates, and have some good anti-virus software, have nothing to worry about. Since it doesn’t seem to do anything, probably no-one has much to worry about.

But the scareware makers will have a field day. Vastly more harm will be done by fake warnings about the conficker worm, either as emails or pop-ups, than will be done by the worm itself.

To repeat my advice of a few days ago, ignore and delete any emails containing breathless warnings about the worst virus ever, and ignore and immediately leave any website which tells you your computer is infected with the conficker worm or any other virus. These things are a con. Even warning emails from friends are a time wasting annoyance.

Just keep Windows updates and anti-virus software up to date, and run a full scan every week or so.

Back on Kangaroo Island

Amanda and I are back home in American River.

Sunrise at American RIver, South Australia

I thank God for the healing work he has done in Amanda over the last two months, and for safe travelling and the kindness of friends.

It’s good to be home. Thank you to everyone who prayed or helped in other ways. The journey is not over, but the first hard steps are done.

© 2024 Qohel