General Information about the Church and the Catholic Faith.

On this section of the website we will try to offer guidance and some sensible answers to questions that we are asked.

There are already many places on the Web where Catholic answers are given - on such sites as Catholic Answers for example!

New Advent Catholic encyclopaedia and answers to difficult questions

Child Protection Policy

Among its other activities, the Parish provides spiritual, catechetical and pastoral care and activities for children and young people. The Parish is committed to protecting and safeguarding children and young people. In accordance with recommendations from the Archdiocese of Southwark and the first report of the Nolan Committee, the Parish drew up its own Child Protection Policy as an "early adopter" of the Church's recommended procedures.

Since that time, the Final Report of the Nolan Committee has been issued and COPCA, the Catholic Office for the Protection of Children and Vulnerable Adults has been set up by the Bishops of England and Wales.

In addition, the Archdiocese of Southwark's Child Protection Team has been established. Fr John Kavanagh is the Archbishop's Representative for Child Protection issues and Helen Sheppard is the Diocesan Child Protection Officer.

The parish of St Thomas the Apostle, Nunhead, is committed to working with the Archdiocese of Southwark's Child Protection Team and with COPCA.

The Diocean Child Protection Team has now issued an interim Child Protection Policy for the whole diocese while a National Policy is being framed. The parish accepts this policy and is updating its own Child Protection Policy accordingly.

Basic Catholic Information.

There is a lot of good Catholic information on the internet. This section offers a few good places to start.

What do Catholics believe?

Catholic Answers - straightforward and readable articles. They also do radio broadcasts that you can listen to on your computer or on your mp3 player.

EWTN - Eternal Word Television Network, another good, popular website. It has articles, television and radio programmes that are accessible to anyone free of charge. (You can watch EWTN in England if you have SKY - it is on channel 769.)

The Catechism of the Catholic Church is a comprehensive but readable summary of the Catholic faith, produced under Pope John Paul II.

New Advent - a website with the entire text of the Catholic Encyclopaedia. This was produced in 1917 and was put on the internet by voluntary workers who scanned or typed in the entire text. It remains an excellent work of reference.

Where can I find out more?

Browse through the links page of the Church of Our Lady of the Rosary, Blackfen for interesting Catholic Links - http://www.rosary.freeuk.com/cathlink.html page or look at something like Catholic Apologetics on the Internet  which has a very good list of links to all sorts of questions about the Catholic faith.

How do I become a Catholic?

Details will be posted here soon.

Saints on the Internet

The Internet has many sites that are dedicated to saints. We have listed some below that will be helpful and interesting.

• Catholic Online, the major Catholic Web portal, has a magnificent saints and angels page with a saints index, patron saints, feast days and a search facility.
• St Patrick's parish in Tenth Street, Washington has an enormous index of thousands of saints at their website with an alphabetical list linked to short biographies.
• Catholic Forum hosts a list of patron saints  according to various patron categories. You can look up a category, select the appropriate item and follow the link to biographical information about the particular patron saint.
• Naming the Saints lists saints for boys and girls with short notes on their lives. You could start here and then look up the saint of your choice at Catholic Online. 
• The Vatican Website has a list of all the new saints canonised by Pope John Paul II.

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