Sean Finlay Sean Finlay recounts a once in a lifetime trip to experience Zambian culture The Zambian Immersion Project at St Mary’s CBS, Portlaoise, offers 16 students a coveted once in a lifetime opportunity to experience Zambian culture first-hand through deeply enriching work in schools, orphanages and health clinics over an unforgettable two weeks. Our…
“Justice must be allowed to run its course,” in connection with child abuse charges levelled in Australia at Cardinal George Pell, who has headed the Vatican’s Secretariat of the Economy since 2014, according to Sydney’s Archbishop Anthony Fisher. Maintaining that the cardinal is entitled to the presumption of innocence while the “impartial pursuit of justice”…
Pope Francis has announced he will create five new cardinals next month, one of whom has dedicated his appointment to slain archbishop, Blessed Oscar Romero. Bishop Gregorio Rosa Chavez from El Salvador said he was surprised when he received a call from the Vatican at 5am on May 21, and expressed his “profound gratitude” to…
“There has never been a greater need for mutual understanding and cooperation”, writes Michael Kelly Sadly we’re becoming all-too-used to that sinking feeling of waking up in the morning to turn on the radio to news of yet another terrorist atrocity in towns and cities that are known to us. That feeling is all-the-more heart-wrenching…
The independent watchdog which monitors handling of abuse allegations in the Irish Church has seen its “sharpest decline” in allegations since it started keeping records. The National Board for the Safeguarding of Children in the Catholic Church in Ireland (NBSCCCI) received 86 new allegations during the period 2016/2017. The allegations include 72 relating to sexual…
Fr Vincent Sherlock Two days before the celebration of Confirmation in our parish we gathered for a short practice. I looked at the group of 38 boys and girls preparing for Confirmation (as an aside, the 38, typical, I would say, of many parishes like my own, represent the total number of pupils in senior…
Mark was preparing for his First Reconciliation and First Communion. These are important days for any child and a lot of work goes in to being ready to receive these sacraments. For Mark, there was even more work because Mark is autistic. His parents and his teacher had put a lot of thought into how…
Greg Daly explores one of the Portuguese appartions’ most intriguing aspects In the decades following the apparitions, Fatima was mainly known, like Lourdes and other Marian sites, as a place of healing. However, in her 1941 memoirs, Sr Lucia wrote about how during Our Lady’s third apparition, she gave the children a message in three…
Ambar Calvo, a 20-year-old student of architecture at the University of Panama, was the winner of the competition among 103 entries for the next World Youth Day logo, to be held in Panama from January 22-27, 2019. Msgr José Domingo Ulloa Mendieta, Archbishop of Panama, said the design managed to capture the message the country…
In recent years apparitions at Kibeho in Rwanda and Champion, in the US state of Wisconsin, have been approved by their diocesan bishops, the former having taken place in 1981-1982, the latter in 1859. Despite devotion on a vast scale, alleged apparitions at Medjugorje in Bosnia-Herzegovina have been rejected by local bishops. Major Marian sites…
Michael Kelly
Mags Gargan
Bairbre Cahill
Greg Daly