World Book and Copyright Day
2022-04-23 00:00 - 23:59 (Australia/Sydney)
Did you know that this date was chosen by the United Nations because it was on this date in 1616 that Miguel de Cervantes, William Shakespeare and Inc Garcilaso de la Vega died?

Read the UNESCO resolution proclaiming the day here.

Access resources for celebrating the day here.

1945: First united Nations Conference opens
2022-04-25 00:00 - 23:59

1986: Nuclear accident in Chernobyl, Ukraine
2022-04-26 00:00 - 23:59

World Day for Health and Safety at Work
2022-04-28 00:00 - 23:59
The International Labour Organisation (ILO) began to celebrate this day in 2003 however the trade union movement internationally has marked this day as the International Commemoration Day for Dead and Injured Workers since 1996. This celebration is an integral part of the Global Strategy on Occupational Safety and Health of the ILO.

As part of the 2020 World Day for safety and health at work campaign, the ILO will produce a global report, highlighting how a comprehensive OSH [occupational safety and health] framework at both national and workplace level could address violence and harassment in the world of work. This includes for example incorporating provisions related to violence and harassment into OSH laws, regulations and collective agreements and developing specific standards, code of practices and guidelines to support the implementation of programmes and preventive measures in the workplaces. At the workplace level, sound OSH management systems can include the assessment and control of psychosocial risks including the interplay with violence and harassment. ILO, World Day for Safety and Health at Work 2020 – Violence and Harassment in the World of Work

International Workers Day
2022-05-01 00:00 - 23:59

World Press Freedom Day
2022-05-03 00:00 - 23:59

World Password Day
2022-05-05 00:00 - 23:59
In his 2005 book Perfect Passwords, security researcher Mark Burnett encourages people to have a ‘password day’ when thy would update important passwords. Intel Security took up the idea in May 2013 and promoted World Password Day. The day is intended to create awareness of the need for good password security and it is observed on the first Thursday of May.

Here are some activities for marking World Password Day:

change your passwords – tips for creating strong passwords can be found herelayer up and implement multi-factor authentication for your important accounts – learn about layered security herelearn about using password managersmake sure your family and friends understand what makes a strong password.

World Red Cross and Red Crescent Day
2022-05-08 00:00 - 23:59

World Fair Trade Day
2022-05-14 00:00 - 23:59
World Fair Trade Day is celebrated on the second Saturday of May every year around the world.

International Day of Families
2022-05-15 00:00 - 23:59
The following reflection is from Andy Hamilton SJ. Andy is an Australian Jesuit, Consulting Editor of Eureka Street, Editorial Consultant to Australian Catholics, and a member of the communications team at Jesuit Social Services.

The coronavirus has put enormous pressures on all of us as persons, and on the groups and institutions to which we belong. It has been an affliction. The response to the measures taken to address it has been mixed. Sometimes it has been narrow and divisive, but more generally it has been extraordinarily good-willed, generous and patient. It has opened out to a far broader and balanced conversation about other areas of life that have been affected by the virus. One of these is the family. World Family Day invites us to reflect inclusively and with broad sympathy on the family.

Reflection on the family is often conducted along narrow lines in which we are tempted to focus on one set of relationships and so neglect other relationships that are equally important for healthy family life. The family, for example, may be seen as a stable relationship, recognised as a marriage by state and church, between mother and father and the children they have borne together. Many people will rightly celebrate this as the Catholic ideal of a good marriage.

Others will appeal to dysfunctional families in dismissing this as a primitive and coercive form of association that inhibits individual growth. They might emphasise the freedom of the individuals involved as central to the family. Discussions about the family will then turn to which forms of relationship justify the name of family, and which are better. These are important questions, but they are not the questions asked first by people living with the daily challenges and opportunities of family life.

The consequences of coronavirus have made us attentive to the complexity and breadth of the relationships involved in families which struggle under its burdens. The economic and social changes brought by the virus have shown, for example, the consequences for the family of relationships involved in losing casual work, in working from home, in the expectation that all adult members of a family will work, in schooling, in recreation, staying in touch with extended family and friends, and educational institutions, of relationships with sport, television and social media, and in a house design that offers both common and personal space.

After coronavirus the way in which these relationships have been shaped can no longer be taken for granted. We shall have experience of the disadvantages and advantages of other shapes we may not have considered. The merits of working from home and of home schooling will be considered as real possibilities of which we have experience and not simply as abstract ideas.

We shall see more clearly, too, how tightly the internal relationships within our families are connected to broader relationships with society. We shall have noticed how pressures of living together in a narrow space can be reflected in family violence and in mental illness. We shall find it difficult to reflect on the inner life of families without setting them against the social conditions in which they live. We shall know that if we wish to address antisocial behaviour we shall have to take account of the social problems that give birth to it.

At Jesuit Social Services we work with young people from families which have been disadvantaged. This has often reflected lacks in the way our society cares for families.

World family day is a time to celebrate the generosity and goodness displayed in families, and the resilience that finds life in the most unfavourable circumstances. It is also a day to ask how as a society we can best to accompany families as they prepare children for a full and generous life.

International Day of Living Together in Peace
2022-05-16 00:00 - 23:59

World telecommunications and Information Society Day
2022-05-17 00:00 - 23:59

World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development
2022-05-21 00:00 - 23:59

International Day for Biological Diversity
2022-05-22 00:00 - 23:59

International Day to End Obstetric Fistula
2022-05-23 00:00 - 23:59

International Day of UN Peacekeepers
2022-05-29 00:00 - 23:59

International Day of Innocent Children Victims of Aggression
2022-06-04 00:00 - 23:59

World Environment Day
2022-06-05 00:00 - 23:59
Celebrated every year since 1974, World Environment Day is a good time to focus on the environmental dimensions of the Sustainable Development Goals. This year the theme is celebrating biodiversity.

The 2020 World Environment Day global campaign aims at highlighting how we as humans are inextricably linked to and depend on nature for our existence and quality of life. Recent events, from bushfires in Brazil, United States and Australia to locust swarms to the COVID-19 outbreak, highlights how meddling with ecosystems and biodiversity from its natural state is creating unprecedented challenges for humankind on a global scale. Human activities such as pollution, unsustainable use of land and sea, exploitation of organisms, climate change and invasion of alien species, are leading to biodiversity breakdown and the decline and degradation of natural ecosystems at an unprecedented scale. The crisis also reflects our connectedness to one another and how actions and events in one part of the world affect us all. It also brings to the spotlight the need for international cooperation and coordination in responding to the challenges posed by environmental degradation. Yet, these events are symptomatic and require us to address the decline of nature through transformational and sustained reforms with nature at the heart of decision-making. This World Environment Day, the need to heal our relationship and start living in harmony with nature, perhaps, has never been this stark in modern history. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is calling on governments, businesses and civil society to work together in building global understanding of biodiversity and nature’s key contribution to our survival… 2020 is a critical year for biodiversity. It’s a year of crucial decisions for planet and people, and all other forms of life on Earth. While 2020 also concludes the United Nations Decade on Biodiversity, the scientific community continues to sound the alarm on global biodiversity breakdown. Living in harmony with nature—a goal world leaders have set for 2050—cannot be achieved unless we stop the loss of the planet’s biodiversity by 2030. This leaves us with a decade for action, which will start with the 2020 United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity in October in Kunming, China and the design of a new 10-year framework for biodiversity. UN Environment Program, Working Brief, 6 April 2020

World Oceans Day
2022-06-08 00:00 - 23:59

World Day Against Child Labour
2022-06-12 00:00 - 23:59

World Elder Abuse Awareness Day
2022-06-15 00:00 - 23:59
Today is a good day to revisit the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Social Justice Statement for 2016–17 ‘A Place at the Table: Social justice in an ageing society’. It celebrates the value, dignity and significant contributions of older people to the life of the community. In solidarity with all generations, older people have a rightful place in the heart of community life. The Bishops consider the circumstances of those who are approaching the end of their lives and warn of the loneliness, ageism and abuse that older people can experience. In particular, the Bishops warn about implications of the current community debate on euthanasia. The Bishops call for communities of mercy and love – where people reach out and minister to vulnerable older people, where bonds between generations are built up, and where no one is cast as being a burden or as rivals to younger generations.

World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought
2022-06-17 00:00 - 23:59

International Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict
2022-06-19 00:00 - 23:59

World Refugee Day
2022-06-20 00:00 - 23:59

Olympic Day
2022-06-23 00:00 - 23:59

International Day in Support of Victims of Torture
2022-06-26 00:00 - 23:59

World Social Media Day
2022-06-30 00:00 - 23:59
Can you imagine living through a pandemic without social media? World Social Media Day is a time to recognise and celebrate social media’s impact of global communication.

Here are some ideas for activities:

Revisit the Social Justice Statement Making it Real: Genuine human encounter in our digital world with your parish, school or community group.Share examples of positive uses of social media to promote social justice.Review the social media policy or guidelines of your parish or community group.Write reviews of your favorite spirituality apps for your parish Facebook page or Catholic magazines – you can submit them for our Social Justice Trends!

International Day of Cooperatives
2022-07-02 00:00 - 23:59
The United Nations International Day of Cooperatives is celebrated annually on the first Saturday of July. This year, the theme of the International Day of Cooperatives 2020 is Cooperatives for Climate Action. Since 1995, the International Cooperative Alliance (ICA) and the United Nations have been setting the theme for the celebration of the International Day through Committee for the Promotion and Advancement of Cooperatives (COPAC).

Find out more here.

World Population Day
2022-07-11 00:00 - 23:59
World Population Day is an annual event, observed on July 11 every year, which seeks to raise awareness of global population issues.

World Youth Skills Day
2022-07-15 00:00 - 23:59
This day highlights the importance of youth skills because rising youth unemployment is seen as one of the most significant problems facing economies and societies in the world today, both for developed and developing countries. Find out more here.
