Bishop Anthony presenting Right Rev Monsignor Robert McGuckin VG EV with his Prelate of Honour of His Holiness in 2011. The Holy Father has appointed Mgr McGuckin as Bishop of Toowoomba. Photo: Alphonsus Fok & Grace Lu

Statement of the Bishop of Parramatta, Most Rev Anthony Fisher OP, on Pope Benedict XVI’s appointment of Right Rev Monsignor Robert McGuckin VG EV as the sixth Bishop of the Diocese of Toowoomba.

The Holy Father has appointed Right Rev Monsignor Robert McGuckin, until now Vicar General of the Diocese of Parramatta, as Bishop of Toowoomba. I am confident that the priests and people of the Diocese share my delight in this appointment.

Since his ordination in 1973 he has served in several parishes of the Archdiocese of Sydney and, from its inception in 1986, of the Diocese of Parramatta.

An expert in Canon Law, he has served as a lecturer, judge and president of the Canon Law Society. He has long been a member and is presently Judicial Vicar of the Regional Tribunal for New South Wales.

In the Diocese of Parramatta he has been Vicar General and Moderator of the Curia since 1997, serving with great diligence and dedication. He has also served as Episcopal Vicar for Religious (1991-2011), Episcopal Vicar for Health and Welfare (2010-12), member of the Council of Priests and College of Consultors (1994-2012), and on several other committees.

From Most Rev Anthony Fisher OP, Bishop of Parramatta

Download an audio file of the Bishop's Easter Message 2012

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When people raise their glasses in a toast and say ‘Cheers’ or ‘Your health’ they might not realise that they are praying. When Jesus rose from the dead His first words were those same ones: Shalom, peace, your health. And then He showed us His wounds.

Ah, we might say, I like the cheers bit, but do we have to be reminded about the violence of this world? It seems we do.

Jesus shows His apostles His wounds to help them understand what sin does. Our resistance to what’s good and true and beautiful lacerates our own souls as much as Jesus’ body. “Crucify him!” is the cry that shame pours upon innocence in every age.

Sometimes other people hurt us, physically or emotionally, financially or morally. Sometimes we hurt them. And sometimes we harm ourselves. When we lash out at God and goodness, or just fail to be all that we could be and should be, it diminishes us, it leaves its wounds.

For all the goodness and beauty around us, we know that there is dysfunction in ourselves and our society, in broken relationships and a world that is not quite as it should be. Which is why we all need cheers, health, salvation.

But what really makes us happy? Love, above all, is what we are hard-wired for. We need friendships with God and neighbour. Deep and lasting friendships. Experiences, too, of health and beauty and truth, of work and play, of internal and external harmony. Evil fractures these things; grace restores them. Sin wounds and kills; grace cheers and raises from the dead.

Christ rose from the tomb to show that every break with God, each other, ourselves, can yet be healed. That nothing can separate us from the love of God. That whatever we’ve done He will have us back if we return to Him. Jesus opens His arms wide, not just to display the hurt of Good Friday and the healing of Easter, but to welcome back every returning soul.

We too are called out of the tomb of our anxieties, grievances and addictions. To be signs of hope and happiness.

It doesn’t come easy. Dietrich Bonheoffer spoke about the illusion of ‘cheap grace’, of imagining that healing always comes easy. Easter, he thought, shows it doesn’t. Our healing cost Christ His life. But He willingly gave His all for us.

From Most Rev Anthony Fisher OP, Bishop of Parramatta

For some of us it might not seem all that long ago that we took part in World Youth Day 2008, the happiest and holiest week in the history of Australia! For others of us it will seem only yesterday that we were getting ready to attend or help other people attend World Youth Day 2011 in Madrid.

Well, believe it or not, there’s another one around the corner and it will be very special. From the 23rd to the 28th of July next year, millions of young people from around the world will descend upon Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to join the Pope in only the second ever World Youth Day in South America.

Given that South America has the biggest Catholic population of any region of the world it might surprise you that the last time it was held there was in 1987, in Argentina, when a million pilgrims joined Blessed John Paul II in the first World Youth Day ever held outside of Rome.

One reason I suspect it’s taken so long to go back to South America is that for much of the world that means going ‘down under’, to the Southern Hemisphere, with its seasons and calendars apparently upside down and its distances seeming so far.

But World Youth Day in Sydney showed the world that nowhere is too far in the 21st Century and that the Southern Hemisphere sports some great Catholic hosts!

So now we are gearing up for Brazil, a land of spectacular beauty, extraordinary culture, friendly people and more …

Brazil has the biggest tropical rain forest in the world. A huge coastline like Australia, with amazing beaches, mountains, rivers and waterfalls.

Like Australia, its most famous city is famous for its harbour. Rio’s harbour is almost as good as Sydney’s but has one big advantage over Sydney: a huge statue of Christ the Redeemer built on a mountain to preside over it!

That’s because Brazil is the largest Catholic country in the world. Around 143 million of its 193 million people are Catholics. Many of the others are Christian also.

Rio is soon to be host to the Soccer World Cup and the Olympics, but bigger and better than either of these will be World Youth Day 2013.

World Youth Day calls together young people of every nation and language, gives them the spiritual experience of their lives, and then sends them out to change the world. So it’s a great choice of theme for this World Youth Day: Our Lord’s invitation to “Go and make disciples of all nations.” (Matt 28:19)

Those of us who go to Rio, like those who took part in Sydney or Madrid, will come home better disciples and willing to help others be disciples of Jesus Christ.

Having organised Sydney’s I know about World Youth Days, from the inside out as it were, and I know what great things it can do for you. It brings people’s faith to life, it enlarges their sense of belonging to the Church, it sets them free to love and give themselves to the adventure of the Gospel.

Hearts are awakened. Ideals are strengthened. Vocations blossom. New futures are opened out …

Deep in their hearts our young people want that. Deep in our hearts we older people want that for them. So together we must see to it that as many as possible have this World Youth Day experience.

The cures that Lent provides

Lenten Message from Most Rev Anthony Fisher OP, Bishop of Parramatta

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'The Temptation of Christ' (1854) - Ary Scheffer.

Lent in those days was an exciting time. There was something heroic about vowing to give up things as important as chocolate, even if it was only for a few weeks. And there were meatless Fridays and only one real meal on certain days. You got to look and feel grave, even dismal, to match the black and purple that covered the statues and the priests in that season. My views of Lent have matured somewhat since then, but such childhood experiences are very formative.

Now, of course, I know a bit more about the history and spirituality of Lenten discipline. I know, for instance, that Lent was from early times a special time of intense preparation for those getting ready to be baptised at Easter. They made a retreat for 40 days, imitating Jesus’ retreat in the desert. From the 3rd Century they were also joined by those who had committed notorious sins and were called to public penance. These penitents were reconciled with the Church in Holy Week. Desert hermits, monks and nuns, also engaged in asceticism of various kinds in the lead-up to Easter.

Why the self-denial? Sin, we know, damages us, our relationship with our neighbours and our relationship with God. Conversion and penance are about being turned upside down, inside-outed, spun around, away from sin and the harm it does and towards something better, a more healthy life-style. Lent proposes three very helpful techniques for this.

One is fasting. We inherited this practice from the Jews and share it with the Muslims and others. It is said to have many benefits: schooling the passions, reducing lust, resisting the devil, teaching temperance, helping appreciate more what we normally have.

More recently, people fast for peace, to identify with the hungry, to take a stand against consumerism, to cleanse themselves of toxins or merely to lose weight. One way or another, fasting seems to help us get a handle on ourselves; to acknowledge our self-indulgence, our over-indulgence, our obsession with our own comfort; to confess that this diminishes us; and to co-operate with God in His project of healing our hearts. Fasting is good for our relationship with ourselves.

Almsgiving – that is, charitable giving to the poor such as Project Compassion – is another practice we share with all the world’s great religions. By giving we assist others in need; but we also try to restore a right relationship between ourselves and others. We try to face up to our selfishness, our unwillingness to share; to acknowledge the injustice and uncharity of a world in which so many starve or are otherwise neglected; we try by engaging in a little generosity to relate better to people. Almsgiving is good for our relationship with others.

Prayer is the third Lenten strategy. Of course, like the other two, it’s an all-year-round practice. But in Lent Catholics try to do a bit extra: they make a good Confession, pray the Stations of the Cross, go to Mass on Fridays, or attend as much as possible of the Triduum ceremonies of Holy Thursday night, Good Friday afternoon and the Easter Vigil.

By prayer we try to face up to our neglect of the spiritual element in our lives, our unwillingness to share our time and space, our minds and wills with God; we acknowledge our spiritual lukewarmness, the practical agnosticism of so much of daily life; and we try to communicate better with the One who most loves us and wants to heal us. Prayer is good for our relationship with God.

Three broken relationships – with our God, our neighbours and ourselves – and three Lenten remedies. This is not self-medicating, mind you: Christ prescribes these medicines for our souls.

Visit the 'Faith in Our Future' site

A Christmas Message from Most Rev Anthony Fisher OP, Bishop of Parramatta , December 2011

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There were presents at the first Christmas. Angels brought songs. Shepherds brought lambs. Wise men brought gold for a baby who would be King, frankincense for a child who would be Priest, and myrrh for One who would die to save the world.

There were presents at the first Christmas and there will be this Christmas. Amidst the economic gloom our businesses hope for some bounce from all the present buying and giving. But we must ask ourselves: how much more stuff do we really need? How many things do we have from last Christmas that we have not touched since? How many other gadgets, clothes, DVDs, or whatever have we accumulated in the meantime, or over the years, that we never even advert to?

Sometimes we keep them for sentimental reasons even if they are not useful. Or because we think we might use them yet. But I wonder how much we are trapped in a culture of accumulating stuff for its own sake, stuff that costs money we could be putting to better uses, stuff we could be sharing with other people instead of hoarding at home...

Recently I heard a woman saying she spent a lot on money on clothes she did not need or even like so she could wear them to impress people she didn’t know and who didn’t notice.

Reflecting on that made her ask all sorts of questions about the sustainability of the consumer economy, the impacts on the natural environment and on the social environment, on people. Behind those were even deeper questions about what we value – in the world, in others, in ourselves.

Our global financial uncertainty invites such questions. Christmas invites such questions.

There were presents at the first Christmas, but there was also the grinding poverty of a young couple living rough and giving birth in a stable. There was the insecurity of a young family having to flee as refugees from the violence around them. There was a cosmic hymn of glory to God in the highest and a cosmic plea for peace and goodwill on earth.

As we attend church services this Christmas, or listen to carols, or say grace to give thanks for all we have received; as we notice the different feel in the streets, the decorations, the frenzied shopping, the Christmas drinks, the holiday heat and roads; as we look at our families across the Christmas dinner table and open our presents with them, we might ask ourselves: don’t people matter so much more than things? What do I want for my loved ones? What do I do for them? What really makes me happy?

One of the artist’s most astonishing works, a Last Judgment.

Advent Message 2011

Most Rev Anthony Fisher OP, Bishop of Parramatta

Blessed Fra Angelico, the early renaissance Dominican and patron of artists, is my favourite painter. I recently gave two illustrated talks on the theology of his art for the Parramatta Institute for Mission. People in the audience said they felt transported to another world by his paintings.

One of his most astonishing works is painted for this time of the liturgical year – one year’s end and a new year’s Advent. It is a Last Judgment, painted in the 1430s for the Florentine Camaldolese convent of Santa Maria degli Angeli.

The detail demonstrates his skills as a young miniaturist, now experimenting in larger works with perspective, portraiture, architecture, nature painting – above all preaching through art.

At the centre is, of course, Jesus. Not Jesus the teacher, healer or guide, not Jesus the enfleshed baby God or the dying Redeemer, though Angelico painted all these at different times.

No, this work is of Christ the King, Judge at the end of ages. His courtiers are the angels and saints, including a disproportionate number of Dominicans (Angelico has his biases!). At Christ’s right hand is, of course, the Blessed Virgin, her arms crossed on her bosom, turning to her Son and making her last intercession for miserable sinners.

The graves are smashed open below and the dead rising to new life. On the left side of the throne, some are led to hell, by horrible demons that would have delighted and terrified the children.

Hell’s cauldrons are not a pretty sight: the dark horror of high gothic art and literature are here, with people gnawing their own flesh in boiling cauldrons, one for each deadly sin. There are ordinary people here, but princes too and prelates, and again, in disproportionate numbers in each cauldron, friars and clerics.

Four last things: death and judgment, heaven and hell. The readings in the November liturgies are full of foreboding of such things. Even as we peel away layers of fertile apocalyptic imagination we cannot escape the insistence of the texts that Christ will come again, in glory and power, to the angst of some and the consolation of others.

Embracing God’s holy will - now and forever

The heavenly gate.

We are not altogether prepared to be confronted with the whole truth about ourselves. Angelico’s Christ is encircled with an aura of bright-shining angels as if He were the Sun. His bright beams reveal the truth and beauty and goodness in each soul – and the more mediocre, more mundane, more sordid too.

For so many of these souls, as for us, so much is yet incomplete when judgment comes. So often we have been less than we could be or should be. The autobiography we’ve been writing since conception has its highlights and its regrets. There are places in ourselves, our families, friendships, workplaces, city where there is still so much to be done, so much promise yet unfulfilled, so many missed opportunities and wrong turns taken.

But Advent’s punctuation is no gruesome full-stop or even an exclamation mark, but a return, the return of Jesus, a new paragraph with the One who is God-with-us, God-for-us, God-one-of-us, the God which every human heart most fundamentally craves and to whose return in glory unready Christians have nonetheless always looked forward, in expectant prayer.

He declares unequivocally that He has come that we might have life, life to the full. The fullest participation in everything that is good is offered to us, if only we will embrace God’s holy will now, right now, and forever.

At the right side of the throne is one of Angelico’s most beautiful scenes: the heavenly gate. He fixes it in a beautiful renaissance garden, for the garden of Eden, God’s first gift to humanity after life itself, is also promised us again at the end. Paradise Lost is Paradise Regained. Amidst all the beauties of creation Angelico places angels dancing in a circle; saints, the picture of health, clothed in glorious vestments; thousands streaming through the gates of heaven.

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In the past few months we’ve really been through the wringer in our part of the world. Floods, cyclones and earthquakes in Japan, New Zealand and Australia have hit us again and again. The pictures of the ruins of Christchurch's Catholic and Anglican cathedrals are etched on our memories even from the safe distance of Parramatta.

And people ask: Where was God in all this? Where was He in Jesus’ last days – in the melee in the garden, the conspiracy of the priests and politicians, the jeering of the crowd, the torture on the cross?

Where was God at Auschwitz? Where was He hiding during the recent natural disasters? Is there any more to this world than destructive natural forces and survival of the fit and fortunate?

At one time or another we all wonder at the problem of evil, whether natural or human. Sometimes we find half-satisfying answers, until something new guts us. Then we feel as the Mother of the Lord must have felt at the foot of the cross. We gape with mute incomprehension and impotence before the mystery of suffering.

Against the backdrop of these recent tragedies Parramatta cathedral was full on Ash Wednesday and I predict it will be full again on Good Friday. Whether queuing for the ashes or ‘creeping to the cross’, people respond when the Liturgy speaks so directly about evil, suffering and mortality.

Dust we are and to dust we shall return. No words, no answers suffice: as in true love, so too in suffering, body language speaks louder than words.

We stand by the cross and wonder at evil. But after the grief our gaping mouths and haunted minds, our sickened hearts and paralysed bodies can move on...

We try in our little way to make some sense and to find some comfort. We conclude, as Christians must conclude, that storms and quakes and other evils are no ‘act of God’ whatever the insurers say; that no innocent person suffers by God’s active will; that even what God permits so as to allow us freedom costs Him greatly; that suffering and death are NOT the last word.

Jesus dies upon the cross in solidarity with all suffering humanity. God goes down into tomb with all those we’ve loved and lost. Jesus goes to the land of the Dead, to speak the compassion of God even there. And He shows them and us the way out. We move with him from the numbness, anger and disgust, to better feelings such as pity and hope. We come to trust creation again, to be reconciled with our enemies, to believe once more.

Rediscovering the Sacrament of Reconciliation

A video version of the Bishop of Parramatta Most Rev Anthony Fisher OP's Pastoral Letter to the priest and faithful of the Catholic Diocese of Parramatta on 'Rediscovering the Sacrament of Reconciliation'. (Recorded for Sunday 3 April 2011).

Download text version of Pastoral Letter on Reconciliation in PDF format

Download Confession Guide in PDF format

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From Most Rev Anthony Fisher OP, Bishop of Parramatta

24 December 2010 

A few years ago a university student from our Diocese of Parramatta took a year off uni and went to Nepal as a volunteer English teacher. She was assigned to a senior high school. As Christmas approached she was aware of whisperings among the students and then discovered that they were trying to work out how to celebrate Christmas for her. They thought there should be a party but weren’t quite sure why. One student came to her after class and said, “We know Christmas is important for you and we know it’s about a god. Is Santa Claus your god?”

Well, who is the God of Christmas? Who is your god at Christmas? Is he the same as the god of Christmas shopping, Christmas office parties, Christmas decorations, the god of Christmas Day gluttony, abandoned Christmas wrapping, the Boxing Day boats and cricket, the long Christmas holidays in the sun?

I suppose my answer is yes and no. Yes, because I don’t want to devalue Christmas cheer, even if it’s sometimes celebrated in less-worthy ways. It’s a good thing that our culture remembers that Jesus’ birthday is worth celebrating. Christians can be proud that the civilisation we built dates itself from the year of His birth, takes a public holiday for the occasion each year, and recognises it with all sorts of celebrations.

But the risk is that we can forget that the word Christmas means Christ’s feast. We can be so caught up in our feast as to forget His, to forget what it’s all about. The commercial Santa can take the place of the Child Jesus and the saints – including the original Santa Claus, St Nicholas, who was a faithful disciple of Jesus, as was our own brand new Aussie saint, Mary MacKillop. We can forget what it is that attracted our forefathers to Christ and His Christmas, and what still draws even non-Christians to this season.

Joy, Love, Peace. These are the highest aspirations and the noblest achievements of human beings. But we easily forget their real meaning, their real cost. All sorts of cut-price imitations are available. What we call happiness and harmony can be uninspired, tired, empty. That’s why we need Christmas every year. We need to recover our hope and our ideals. We need to learn again not only who God is and how to relate to Him, but also who we are and of what we are capable, by God’s power.

But sometimes God seems very far away, so far we doubt his existence or relevance. Sometimes His grandeur provokes our resistance, because it makes us feel puny and threatened. Pope Benedict XVI suggests that this is why God chose to become a child at Christmas. “He made himself dependent and weak, in need of our love. Now, this God who has become a child says to us: You can no longer fear me, you can only love me.”

I invite you to come to church this Christmas and bring with you any family and friends who haven’t been for a while and even people who’ve never been to Church. Come yourself and bring others with you so that together we might renew our faith, hope and love – for the world, our families, ourselves.

Most Rev Anthony Fisher OP, Bishop of Parramatta.

Just a week out from the election the ABC joined the debate over population with a program called Population Puzzle and a follow-up Q&A. An example of what’s criticised in the commercial media as “cash for comment”, the show was financially underwritten by its star, the anti-population campaigner Dick Smith.

Endorsing the ALP’s shift away from “Big Australia” towards a smaller “Sustainable Population”, the national broadcaster gave Mr Smith a platform to dump on growth capitalism and its insatiable appetite for imported skilled labour. Greens leader Senator Bob Brown was as trenchantly anti-population as ever, while the Opposition, though more pro-population, joined the auction to be the party toughest on migrants and refugees.

The Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, keeps telling us that Western Sydney is already suffering particular “stress” or “congestion” from population. With roughly two-thirds of the extra 1.7 million people projected for Sydney by 2036 expected to make their homes out West, we are told that we are already over-populated. But how would we know?

All parties now want to slow Australia’s immigration rate and “get tough” (or even tougher) on asylum seekers. Incredibly, some people also want to reduce Australia’s family sizes – already among the world’s lowest.

A range of interests, prejudices and genuine arguments collide here: the perennial fear of newcomers; a view of human beings as “pollution” of an ideally people-free environment; fear of a boat-borne “Asian invasion”, complete with people smugglers, queue-hoppers and terrorists; anti-capitalist and anti-development feeling; Malthusian nightmares of people over-breeding and over-consuming resources.

There is also: the sheer costs and complexity of providing for ever-expanding cities; evasion of responsibility for urban planning and infrastructure; annoyance with peak hour congestion and other symptoms of rapid city growth; the ongoing climate apocalyptic; and anti-family and anti-child attitudes.

There are some serious issues here, as well as prejudice and paranoia. Slogans and spin driven by such passions are no basis for sound policy.

It is a paradox that in this “nation of migrants” anti-immigration feeling is never far beneath the surface – nowadays a surface coat of green paint. There is a similar paradox in the rhetoric about the need for population control in the world’s least-populated continent.

Hostility to “population” is hostility to people – people in the abstract, rather than particular people, and especially to babies, especially poor people’s babies. While contraception and abortion have allowed the West to enjoy a copulation explosion at the same time as a population implosion, there are still too many people around for some.

Whether it’s green Australia instead of white Australia, or sustainable population instead of population control, Australia is again said to be “full” or to have nearly reached “carrying capacity”.

Yet the fact remains: Australia has close to the lowest population density in the world. Most of our country by far is uninhabited or barely so. By the standards of Manhattan we could all fit into the Canberra area and leave the rest of the country as farms and national parks. Not that everyone wants to live as cheek-by-jowl as New Yorkers.

My point is simply: Australia – including Western Sydney where I live – is nowhere near population overload. Our problem is a lack of appropriate planning, infrastructure and services to match our population.

Christ’s entry test for crossing the border into heaven was this: when I was hungry, lonely, a stranger, desperate, did you welcome me? (Matthew Chapter 25).

Australians can be proud of how hospitable they usually are to newcomers and grateful for the ways those newcomers have enriched us.

To close the borders of our country to all but a favoured few (with the right skills) would diminish us not just economically but culturally, morally and spiritually.

To close the borders of our homes to all but a favoured few babies is also impoverishing. Australia can allow and should support larger family sizes than the present rate of one or two children per family.

Governments, churches, business and the community must play their part in addressing the big infrastructure shortages in the cities, as well as providing incentives for decentralisation.

It is not beyond human wit to find ways of doing this without destroying ecosystems, running out of water or being trapped in carparks called motorways.

Bishop Anthony Fisher’s Message for Good Shepherd Sunday Fourth Sunday of Easter 25 April 2010
(World Day of Prayer for Vocations)

What must I do to inherit eternal life – a young man once asked Jesus. What’s my life for? What’s it all about? Is there more to life than what I’ve got now, what I’m doing now?

These are a young person’s questions, important questions. We get our whole life to discern our vocation and try to live it. But we only get one life to do it in. So it’s personal and it’s urgent.

Good Shepherd Sunday is a special chance to ask these big questions with the Church’s help, with the help of the Good Shepherd Himself. Take your hopes and dreams and issues to Him in prayer. Have a look at our vocations website. Talk to a priest about it, especially Fr Paul Roberts, our Diocesan Director of Vocations.

The priesthood has taken a beating lately. The terrible crimes of a few have damaged the credibility of all. What do we, as a Church, do about that? We hang our heads in shame before God and the world. We repent and do penance. We seek forgiveness from the victims and justice and healing for them. We seek to make sure this does not happen again.

But we never give up on the priesthood. What would that be saying to Christ whose priesthood it is? What would it be saying of the countless powerful and beautiful things Christ has done through His priests? What would it say to people of all ages who need the help of Christ’s priests?

The Church makes the Eucharist and is also made by the Eucharist, so without priests we are nothing. We need more, happy and holy priests:

• joyful in proclaiming the Risen Christ;
• close to Him in prayer;
• being there for people as good shepherds;
• and mediating God’s mercy to all.

We need priests who are:

• humble and faithful;
• ready to lead and serve;
• ready to sanctify through prayer and sacrament;
• ready to preach and teach, not just any opinion, but the
• living words of Jesus Christ in the teachings of His Church.

We need priests alive with Christ and giving their all.

I love being a priest. I love being a religious. There’s no better life. It brings you close to God and close to His people. And you bring God and people closer to each other. What a privilege! What a grace!

The Diocese of Parramatta needs you. Either to be a priest or religious, or to support those who should be. Don’t be put off by the bad wrap some people give the Church. You know that most priests and religious do a superb job: loving, serving, striving and living for Christ and His people.

Don’t be put off by thinking you’re not holy enough or learned enough or articulate enough or prayerful enough. If you have a passion for God and the things of God, if you care about people and the future of our world, the priesthood or consecrated life will give you what you need. God will give you what you need.

The people of the Diocese of Parramatta want you to lead and serve them!

May Christ the Good Shepherd bless your search. May His Blessed Mother accompany you. May St John Vianney and our soon-to-be St Mary MacKillop inspire you.