Rainbow Catholics InterAgency for Ministry - Australia
Who We Are
Our Ministry
We are a pastoral interagency supporting pastoral worker, pastoral leaders and pastoral organizers in the Australian Catholic church.
Affirmed by our Christian faith and supported by Catholic Social Teaching, the primary purpose of the Rainbow Catholics InterAgency for Ministry is to build relationships, to promote dialogue, to pray and to educate the Catholic community in Australia. We work to advocate for recognition of the full equality and for justice with LGBTIQ Catholics, their families and friends in the Catholic Church and in our larger community.
Through an interagency approach in which each Catholic organization and group member is in an active ministry with LGBTIQ Catholic Christians, we celebrate the gifts, the experiences, the wholeness and the achievements and the journeys of LGBTQIA+ members of our Catholic communities, affirming their faith, sexuality, gender identity and intersex status. We work towards ending homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, intersex erasure in our church and in our communities where discrimination, exclusion and prejudice occurs.
Ongoing Work
Bringing Change
Australian Catholic LGBTQIA+ Pastoral Survey
Mapping our realities and support network
We would like to learn and understand what are the stories, experiences and issues faced by our LGBTQIA+ Catholic sisters, brothers and siblings as well as their families, friends, colleagues and allies. This will give us as a collective grassroots interagency a better idea of the realities and the support they're creating, providing or receiving in Australia. So if you are interested in taking part or supporting this survey in any way, please do not hesitate to contact us.
Australian National Rainbow Catholic
Pastoral Care Guide
Pastoral Care with LGBTIQA+ Catholics in the 21st Century
A living document prepared by Rainbow Catholics interAgency for Ministry (RCiA) to identify and explore ways the Catholic family might include LGBTIQA+ Catholics, their families and friends in a conversation about their Pastoral Care. This document aims to offer support for and integration of an approach to pastoral care with LGBTIQA+ people in the Catholic context. We build on the work of international Catholic theologians, pastoral practitioners and organistaions such as John J McNeill, Jeannine Gramick, James Martin, Robert Nugent and James Alison, DignityUSA, LGBTI Catholics Westminster and New Ways Ministry, and Australian pastoral practitioners and organisations including Garry Pye and Acceptance. We hope it will offer support for those seeking to create more inclusive, Gospel-centred and just spaces in the Catholic church in ways of thinking and acting.
We hope it will generate further discussion and action. We see it as a starting point in a developing work that will continue to grow as we reflect upon the gospel and effective and creative pastoral care practices.
"God's love calls us to move beyond fear. We ask God for the courage to put on faith, hope and love as we go out into the world and become the word in body as well as spirit."
