This year is a special one for many reasons. We will be celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, this gift that the Lord sent the Church to help reawaken faith in Christ and the power of his Holy Spirit. There will be two important celebrations for us in England organised by the National Service Committee. One will be held at Trinity and All Saints in Leeds on Saturday 17th February, and the second at Westminster Cathedral on Saturday, 5th May, 2007. Make sure you get your tickets for the Westminster event by sending £5 and a SAE to the Goodnews office.

This year also sees the 40th anniversary of Populorum Progressio and the Live Simply Campaign launched by CAFOD, which Fr Mark White wrote about last month. This encourages us to go back to this document on development and social justice and see how we are conforming our lives to what it says. Finally this year sees the second centenary of the ending of the slave trade, an injustice which Christians in the late 18th/early 19th century were in the forefront of campaigning against. There will no doubt be many events in the Church and in society to mark this, so keep a look out for them. One is the excellent film "Amazing Grace", which has a stellar cast of British actors including Albert Finney and Michael Gambon. This tells the story of the life of William Wilberforce, an evangelical Christian politician, who spear-headed the campaign to end the slave trade. I was touched by the suffering he was prepared to endure because of his calling. Growing in love through suffering is the theme of Sr Nancy Kellar's third teaching on love. In it she gives a helpful framework which can be used to give a prayer group's talk.

Several months ago I was fortunate to attend part of the city mission organised by Cardinal Danneels in Brussels. In this issue we reprint part of the Cardinal's reflections on the New Evangelisation and the charisms that he sees the Holy Spirit has raised up to make this effective, both in terms of people, gifts and communities.

One person who has responded to this radical call of the Lord is Lisa McCready. She was so touched by a talk given by Lord David Alton at the Celebrate Conference last year, in which he outlined the battle for the sanctity of life that is going on in our society at the moment, that she has given up her successful career as a hospital consultant, to retrain in palliative care. In a society obsessed with youth it is easy to write off the elderly. Judy Fox, Doreen Troiani and their little team, however, have spent the last 15 years visiting nursing homes and running prayer meetings for residents. In this issue we hear about how it all started. We also learn of a wonderful resource developed by Alison Riggott and Patrick Lynch to enable the housebound to have a seven day retreat at home.

In the Charismatic Renewal we have been granted great insights and experience of God's healing power. This always has to be held in tension, however, with the redemptive power of suffering too. Graham Crowhurst, who is a carer for his wife Linda, who suffers from ME, tells us how he has been helped by the Catholic Church's teaching on redemptive suffering to understand and live their situation. Linda herself contributes some moving prayers. John Edwards, who is a member of the Goodnews team, and in remission from leukaemia, explains how he discovered the power of praise as a way of coping in the darkest hours of his illness.

Caring for someone one to one is very time consuming and those who opt to do this go very much against the current trend. Thus Robertson McQuilkin caused quite a stir when he gave up his prestigious job as the president of a large evangelical bible college in the USA to care for his wife, who suffered from Alzheimer's Disease. In "Muriel's Blessing", he tells of the blessings he received from his decision. Fr Chris Thomas meanwhile challenges us in our attitudes to those on the margins of society, and asks how we see them, in his article "The Gospel of the Outsider". The New Year is always a time to take stock and reflect on our priorities and our mission. Do we give enough time and space to God in our lives? I was recently challenged by this to give up watching television, not simply as a sacrifice, but as a way of uncluttering my mind so I could hear God better. In "God and TV" I share my experiences of this. Charles Whitehead meanwhile concludes his challenging article on Christian Stewardship by focussing on our attitude as Christians to money and its use. Fr Pat Collins CM, (currently spending two years on sabbatical in the USA doing further studies in evangelisation) in this issue reflects on the principle of reciprocity in the bible which illuminates the relationship between grace and works in our salvation.

We have all our other usual features and in Ireland, instead of the coming events pages, they have a great article by Fr Jack McArdle about the recent Life in the Spirit seminars they have been doing in parish Masses.

Kristina Cooper