Intercolonial

New Zealand Tablet, 14 July 1910, Page 1115

Intercolonial

Out of the farewell purse of sovereigns recently presented to the Very Rev. Father R. Butler by the Cootamundra parishioners, Father Butler gave £IOO towards the fund for the purchase of a pipe organ for St. Columba’s Church, Cootamundra.

The Rev. Father T. Kelleher, of Rookwood, has just been appointed to the parish of LithgQw to take charge of the outlying parts of the parish with residence at Hartley. The Rev. Father J. H. Kelly goes from Bulli as assistant to the Rev. Father Kirby at Rookwood.

His Eminence Cardinal Moran purposes to organise a roll of honor, to be placed in the completed Cathedral. By public and personal appeal to the friends and supporters of St. Mary’s everywhere his Eminence hopes to obtain subscribers of £2O a year for five years. Five hundred such subscribers would realise the goodly sum of £50,000 out of the £IOO,OOO, which, it is estimated, the completion of St. Mary’s will cost. Rev. Father J. J. Gunning was presented by the pupils of the Convent High School, Bega, on June 22 with a handsome set of fish knives and forks, and an illuminated address, in honor of the silver jubilee of his priesthood. Father • Gunning replied, expressing his gratitude and pleasure at receiving the address and handsome gift. A few days later Father Gunning was presented with a handsome solid silver chalice by his people.

The death of the Rev. Father Joseph P. Ryan, of Sandstone, W.A., took place on June 2. The remains were brought to St. Francis Xavier’s Church, Geraldton, where the obsequies were held. Bishop Kelly celebrated the Requiem Mass, and the funeral was the largest seen in the little town for years. Father Ryan was parish priest of Sandstone, Geraldton. He was born in Penshurst, Victoria, in 1873, and ordained at Sale for the diocese of Geraldton, in 1898. The Bishop paid a glowing tribute to his memory.

A large residential property in Upper Hawthorn, containing over 20 rooms, and standing on ground with a frontage of 300 ft on Havelock road, has been purchased by the community of the Sisters of St. Joseph (says the Melbourne Advocate). It will'serve primarily as a residence for the nuns, but it will also be available for the general purposes of the community in Victoria. Here the nuns will make their annual retreat. The building cost originally over £14,000. The formal opening by his Grace the Archbishop of Melbourne takes place on Sunday, July 17.

Rev. Father T. Lee, who has been stationed at Gympie for the past four years, left for Gayndah recently, where he has been appointed parish priest. Prior to his departure (says the Catholic Press) Father Lee was tendered a farewell, when he received a purse of sovereigns from the Gympie parishioners; a travelling bag, suitably inscribed, from the choir of St. Joseph’s Church, Monkland; a handsome riding whip, from the teachers of St. Patrick’s Convent School, Gympie, and a purse of sovereigns from the Christian Brothers’ School, Gympie.

The Commonwealth Bureau of Statistics has published a statement of the estimate of the population of Australia for the quarter ending March 31, which shows that while Victoria’s population has decreased by 924, the population of New South Wales has increased by 14,420; Queensland’s by 5480; West Australia’s by 2372; South Australia’s by 2325. The ‘ tight little island ’ (Tasmania) has lost population, like Victoria, the loss being 1474. The population of New South Wales is now estimated, at 870,308 males and 765,789 females, while the estimate of Victoria’s population is 654,870 males and 647,533 . females. Victoria is behind New South Wales in population to the extent of 333,674, or nearly one-third of a million.

Our valued Catholic contemporary, the Sydney Freeman’s Journal, has just entered on its sixty-first year. The first issue of the Freeman, published at sd, contained six pages of eighteen columns. The primary objects of the journal, as set forth in its leading article, ‘ shall he to study and promote the greatest good for the greatest number.’ Further, it states: ‘ While we take care that our Catholic readers shall be supplied with a fair share of information regarding the state and progress of the Church and of their fellow-Catholics throughout the world, especially in that illgoverned, long-suffering, yet ever-faithful land of Ireland, we shall not make our- columns an arena for acrimonious or religious controversy. We shall, however, be ready, when assailed, to explain and defend our tenets with that spirit of charity and truth which alone is recognised and sanctioned by the Divine Author of the New Testament.’ The records of sixty years (says our contemporary) tell a tale of honorable press activity, in which the championship of Catholicity and the cause of Ireland linked together were adorning features. ________________