Questions of Faith It’s common today for religious or spiritual people to speak of guardian angels – divine entities which protect and guide somebody in their everyday lives. The Church has no qualms about the existence of angels, which are best described as pure spirits created by God. The word ‘angel’ derives from the Greek…
Farmers are heavily in favour of age-restrictions on pornography, with only 3% believing there should be free access. An Irish Examiner/ICMSA poll of farmers and farming families found that 72% believe strongly there should be age restrictions, with 14% slightly agreeing. Support for the restriction was similar across all age groups, peaking among people aged…
A priest and a nurse working at a Catholic school in India’s eastern state of Jharkhand have been held in custody after being charged with sexually abusing a nine-year-old girl. Church officials in the state, where the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party runs the government, say the case was fabricated amid a hostile atmosphere generated toward…
You think about strange things when you wake up with a bout of insomnia at 3am. One of those small-hours anxiety I’ve had is that my driving licence expires in eight months’ time. And I’m worrying whether it will be renewed. Will I pass the tests for older drivers, of alertness and awareness, and will…
Mothers have a vital role in children’s mental health and families staying together, new research suggests. According to a study by the UK’s Marriage Foundation in conjunction with Lincoln University, a mother’s happiness is nearly twice as important as a father’s when it comes to family life and the chances of a couple staying together.…
Letter from Rome When roughly 300 Catholic leaders gather in Rome from October 6-27 to talk about the Amazon, it will be the 29th time since 1965 a Pope has convoked a Synod of Bishops. For most of that span, the body’s role could have been described in the same ironic terms Bob Dole once…
Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, Major Archbishop of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, has urged those considering allowing priests in the Latin rite to marry in order to help solve a crippling shortage, to proceed with caution, saying marriage has not curbed shortages in his own rite. With five blooming seminaries in Ukraine alone, “thanks be to…
The Life and Times of Mary Ann McCracken (1770 – 1866) by Mary McNeill, (Irish Academic Press, €22.95 / £19.99) J. Anthony Gaughan This was first published in 1960. Ever since it has been valued by historians as an excellent biography of Mary Ann McCracken and a definitive account of the United Irishmen. Mary Ann was…
Reforms to RTÉ should not come at a cost to the national broadcaster’s regional public service role, Senator Rónán Mullen has said. Responding to statements that RTÉ is considering selling its Cork Leeside studio, the independent senator said this looked like “a calculated act of limited self-preservation for a model of operations that is already…
Ireland’s parents and principals are struggling to keep primary schools afloat, writes Greg Daly If there’s a silver lining in the Government’s banning oversubscribed schools owned by Catholic parishes from selecting on the basis of religion, it’s that it removed another distraction from the real story in Irish primary education, which is that the…
Colm Fitzpatrick
Chai Brady
Mary Kenny
John L. Allen Jr.
Greg Daly