A Senate vote on gay marriage is a destructive pretension against the plan of God

You cannot be in a position of power and destroy the life of another person.

You can't provoke, you can't insult the faith of others, you can't make fun of faith.

Our world is facing a refugee crisis of a magnitude not seen since the Second World War. This presents us with great challenges and many hard decisions.

I want to remind priests that the confessional must not be a torture chamber but rather an encounter with the Lord’s mercy which spurs us on to do our best. A small step, in the midst of great human limitations, can be more pleasing to God than a life which appears outwardly in order but moves through the day without confronting great difficulties. Everyone needs to be touched by the comfort and attraction of God’s saving love, which is mysteriously at work in each person, above and beyond their faults and failings.

Today, we need a Church capable of walking at people's side, of doing more than simply listening to them.... At times we lose people because they don't understand what we are saying, because we have forgotten the language of simplicity and import an intellectualism foreign to our people.... We cannot keep ourselves shut up in parishes, in our communities, when so many people are waiting for the Gospel.

Religious freedom is a fundamental human right.