Month: February 2017

Take charge of your own choices

January begins with new promises and resolutions for the year. One of the most popular new year’s resolutions is to eat more healthily, especially if you enjoyed lots of selection boxes and chocolate coins over the festive season. It can be hard to break out of a habit of eating sweets and chocolate but you…

Getting the balance right

As you look forward to the year ahead, I am sure that like many others you have made resolutions and hope to keep to at least some of them. Parents have a the most responsible job in the world because your every action, gesture and word impacts on your children. When you stop to think…

A year without spending

Michelle McGagh Michelle McGagh describes how she saved £22,000 in just one year “You’re not buying anything? At all? For a whole year?” This is the phrase that I’ve heard a million times, usually followed by: “I could never do that!” And it’s true, most people don’t want to give up spending and treating themselves…

God’s power as powerlessness

The French novelist and essayist, Leon Bloy, once made this comment about God’s power in our world: “God seems to have condemned himself until the end of time not to exercise any immediate right of a master over a servant or a king over a subject. We can do what we want. He will defend…

Dear Editor, Prof. William Reville asserts that defining meaning in our lives is a precursor to happiness, as he concords with author Emily Esfahani Smith in her book, The Power of Meaning (IC, 12/1/2017). Taking this approach is to miss the whole point of happiness, that it is the natural state of a human being.…

Dear Editor, In regard to the incident on The Late Late Show two weeks ago where the Eucharist was openly mocked and ridiculed, it’s difficult to know what was the worst aspect of the whole sorry episode. Was it the ignorance, the gratuitous contempt shown, the studied insult to those who actually pay to keep…

Vatican Roundup

Order of Malta Grand Master resigns The grand master of the Knights of Malta has resigned after Pope Francis declared all actions undertaken by him since the December dismissal of Grand Chancellor Albrecht Freiherr von Boeselager “null and void”. According to the National Catholic Register, Fra’ Matthew Festing was summoned to an audience with Pope…

Rebuilding of Iraqi Christian communities begins

The Chaldean Patriarchate in Iraq has begun to distribute funds to dioceses and parishes to begin the rebuilding of communities in areas liberated from so-called Islamic State (ISIS). As Patriarch Raphael Louis Sako I led a delegation to the Nineveh Plain las week to view for himself the damage inflicted on homes and churches by…

US and Mexican bishops decry Trump border wall

The Catholic bishops of Mexico have lamented the executive order signed by President Donald Trump which signals the start of the process to build his notorious southern border wall. Reacting to news of the order, the bishops issued a statement in which they called for consideration on how to create employment and promote security without…

The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has called on the nation’s government to help with rebuilding churches across the north-eastern states after a report revealed that at least 900 Christian places of worship have been destroyed by Boko Haram since the group began its violent activities.  Having gathered for a meeting of its national executive…