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Puskat Audio Visual Studio conducted an interreligious workshop in Sinduharjo, Yogyakarta, Indonesia attended by 49 participants and visitors, almost half of whom were members of 5 non-Christian religions. The goal of the workshop was to promote religion on television for peace, justice, and the integrity of creation. Father Pierre Babin, O.M.I., gave the main conference on the meaning of religion in an audio-visual culture. During the workshop, religious television programs from five different religions were screened and evaluated. A similar workshop is planned for September 1998.

During the first meeting for the FABC 'Bishops' Institute for Social Communication' (BISCOM), participants 'came to appreciate that especially tailored PR (Public Relations) applications can help improve church work in Asia.' People from many countries provided background information on news, advertising, social marketing, building public trust, crisis management, and the use of the Internet.

Two of the main feelings were that consistent honesty and openness, both internally and externally, be promoted by the Church, and that there should be sensitivity to interreligious dialogue and co-operation with other religions at all levels.

Fr. Desmond D'Monte, SJ, Director of the Xavier Institute of Communications (XIC) died in a car accident on the Bombay-Pune Highway. His sudden loss will be deeply felt for a long time by the staff, students and faculty of XIC.

Fr. Desmond took over as director of XIC in July 1993. His main work was that of providing media professionals and development organisations with a variety of services in training and production. To this end there is now an annual communications workshop on some aspect of the media at the Bombay Diocesan Seminary for scholastics and seminarians. He also designed workshops on 3D Graphics and Computer Animation for media professionals. By introducing the Internet, he brought the XIC up-to-date in the modern computer world. He had many other plans for development which, as yet, have not come to fruition.

Fr. V.J. 'Joe' Naidu, SJ, the late founder of the Karnataka Jesuit Media Centre in Bangalore, Secretary Treasurer of OCIC Asia, and Member of the Board of Directors OCIC (Brussels), was a pioneer in the field of social communications in India. This selection of his writings from 1991-95 called Issues in the Media, shows his belief that we are all part of an audio-visual civilisation. 'His conviction that media can and should be utilised in service of most fields urban, social, cultural, religious and educational emerges consistently in all his essays.'

Professor Emeritus Kato Tomohiro of Oita University won the Rodriguez Tcuzu Prize for his book on feudal lord Otomo Sorin and Christian missionaries. The prize is given in recognition of outstanding publications on the relation between Japan and Portugal. It is named after Jesuit Joao Rodriguez Tcuzu who came to Japan in 1577 and became an active interpreter.

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