Courtney McGrailThe Supreme Court in Lahore, Pakistan, received a written demand, signed by 150 Islamic clerics, for the immediate execution of imprisoned Christian woman Asia Bibi in the days before her latest appeal, it has emerged. As judges prepared to hear what had been reported to be the woman’s final appeal against the death sentence handed…
Month: October 2016
Heavenly heroes of the Faith
Peter CostelloThe Saints: A Short History by Simon Yarrow (Oxford University Press, £10.99)
Missions in a Merciful Year
The Extraordinary Year of Mercy is a fitting backdrop for this year’s World Mission Sunday, Pope Francis said in his message for the day, explaining how the Jubilee year invites us to consider the Church’s mission to non-Christians as a vast work of mercy. He explained how we are all called to “go out” as…
World News in Brief
Priest murdered in Brazil A murder investigation is underway in Brazil after a priest was discovered apparently stabbed to death on a roadside in Rio de Janeiro state. Fr Francisco Carlos Barbosa, 37, was pastor of Our Lady of Lourdes parish in the district of São Benedito in Nova Iguacu, and was last seen driving in the area.…
Childcare and the Swedish model
Dear Editor, Minister Katherine Zappone’s childcare scheme unfairly discriminates against stay-at-home parents. This is both unfair financially and disastrously flawed socially. The scheme sees parents who are both earning the median industrial wage, with two children in daycare, increase their previous yearly net income of €32,542 by €1920 (after tax and childcare costs). Meanwhile, a…
Cold erudition supported by complex arguments
Dear Editor, What are we going to do about the huge gulf that exists between the more erudite members of the Church and the ordinary people who are not being taught to meet Jesus Christ in the world of today? The teaching Church in the Vatican seems to have become an increasingly unwieldy bureaucracy. Words…
On not cultivating restlessness
Fr Ronald RolheiserThirty-four years ago when I launched this column, I would never have said this: restlessness is not something to be cultivated, no matter how romantic that might seem. Don’t get Jesus confused with Hamlet, peace with disquiet, depth with dissatisfaction or genuine happiness with the existential anxiety of the artist. Restlessness inside us doesn’t need…
The gift of faith across the years
Brendan O’ReganIt’s great to hear people being enthusiastic about their faith…it can be inspirational and infectious. These thoughts were prompted by last Saturday night’s The Conversation on BBC World Service. Two religious sisters were interviewed: Mother Hildegard a Benedictine sister from Australia but now in Tyburn Convent, London and Sr Tracy Kemme, a young American woman…
The world that produced Playboy also produced Donald Trump
David QuinnThe presidential candidate is a symptom of a wider malaise, writes David Quinn
Turkish dossier links interfaith dialogue to July coup
A government department in Turkey has said interfaith dialogue with Christians was the path by which those allegedly behind the July 15 coup laid their plans. In a dossier compiled by the Presidency of Religious Affairs of Turkey, the exiled Islamic cleric Fetullah Gulen, nemesis to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is accused of exploiting interfaith…