In the 2024 – 2025 Social Justice Statement, “Truth and Peace: A Gospel Word in a Violent World”, Australia’s Bishops scrutinise the signs of our own troubled times, observe the violence around us, and ask why it is so. They also ask what is needed if there is to be peace.
In This years Social Justice Statement, Australia’s Bishops invite us to renew our engagement with the First Peoples of Australia. They have come to this view through much listening to the First Peoples and they encourage us all to listen to them in a spirit of love and humility.
Respect: Confronting Violence and Abuse points out that the roots of domestic and family violence “lie in the abuse of power to control and dominate others” and that “this stands in contrast to the relationships to which God calls us”. Our relationships should be “marked by equality and reciprocity rather than domination and violence, respect and freedom rather than coercion and control”. We reject the manipulation of religious teachings to justify violence and abuse. We support women in calling for respect in relationships; their lives and those of their children are sacred.
The Bishop’s Social Justice Statement 2021-22: Cry of the Earth, Cry of the Poor, affirms that “we human beings need a change of heart, mind, and behaviour.’ It draws from Scripture, from the theological tradition, from Catholic Social Teaching, and from the wisdom of the world, including the insights of First Nations people.
The Bishops invite us all to reject stigmatisation, to work for the transformation of social determinants of mental ill-health, and to call for policies and service provision that meets the needs of the poorest and most marginalised members of our community.
The Australian Catholic Bishops’ Social Justice Statement for 2019 – 2020, Making it Real: Genuine human encounter in our digital world, affirms the positive possibilities for encounter and solidarity offered by new digital media, while warning of those elements of our digital world that may be harmful.
The Australian Catholic Bishops’ Social Justice Statement for 2018–19 is titled A Place to Call Home: Making a home for everyone in our land. It confronts the growing challenge of homelessness and housing insecurity in Australia. The latest Census figures show that more than 116,000 Australians are homeless – something unacceptable for a rich and well-resourced nation like ours.
The Australian Catholic Bishops’ Social Justice Statement for 2017–18 is titled ‘Everyone’s Business: Developing an inclusive and sustainable economy’. The Bishops call for an economy that is founded on justice and offers dignity and inclusion to every person.
The number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double by the middle of the century. This has been rightly described as ‘the great success story of human development’.
The Social Justice Statement 2015-16 invites us to reflect on the call of Jesus to welcome those in most need and to give comfort to those who come to us in flight from fear and suffering.