Letter from Rome Back in the mid-1980s, rebel Brazilian Franciscan Leonardo Boff was the enfant terrible of Latin America’s liberation theology movement, and he had a couple of celebrated run-ins with then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the Vatican’s doctrinal czar under St John Paul II and the future Pope Benedict XVI. At one point, Ratzinger jokingly said…
Chai Brady speaks to religious orders about ‘confusing’ Minister of Religion visa procedures After a Government department updated its policy regarding visas for clergy and religious hoping to do pastoral work in Ireland, confusion and claims it is outright “discriminatory” have followed. A division of the Department of Justice stopped issuing Minister of Religion (MoR),…
Northern bishops have sharply criticised nationalist politicians for their failure to stand up to prevent abortion being imposed on the region. The move – which took effect at midnight on Monday – came after a sitting of the assembly was unable to form an executive due to the failure of both Sinn Féin and the…
Glenstal Abbey through the seasons with photographs by Valerie O’Sullivan, edited by Colman Ó Clabaigh OSB (Columba Books, €24.99) Through pictures and text this beautiful book captures the life of one of Ireland’s most famous abbeys. At the heart of it all is an annual round of worship, prayer and reflection. But this is also…
Priests and bishops who have stirred up contempt for the religious traditions of indigenous South America people are partly to blame for the desecration of religious images, an Irish priest from the Jesuits’ Paraguayan province has said. Commenting on how statues of a pregnant woman, identified as symbols of life and ‘Our Lady of the…
Your Faith in Our Schools Chai Brady learns about the unique approach of true Catholic schooling The power of Cat-holic education is the person-centred approach of teachers who “nurture” pupils and truly get to know them over time, according to the incoming chair of the Catholic Principals Association (CPA) at their conference in Belfast at…
Catholic teachers in Ghana have joined the bishops’ conference and Muslim organisations in urging the government to withdraw a sex education program from the national school curriculum. The “unlimited scope and span” of the comprehensive program, launched this year by the government and UNESCO, “would create room for anything to be introduced…by interested groups or…
The Education of an Idealist Samantha Power (William Collins, £20/€25) Felix M. Larkin Samantha Power knows how to tell a story well, and what a story she has to tell in this autobiography. Born in London in 1970 to Irish parents – a dentist and a medical doctor – and raised in Ireland until she…
Some 40 bishops participating in the Synod of Bishops on the Amazon gathered on Sunday in the Catacombs of St Domitilla in Rome to renew a pact signed in 1965 by 42 prelates at the Second Vatican Council calling for a poor Church. Though both ‘Pacts of the Catacombs’ were inspired by a commitment to…
Vocation crisis caused by lack of holiness not celibacy – bishop A bishop in Brazil who is a member of the Amazon synod has said he believes a major obstacle to increasing priestly vocations in the region is a lack of personal holiness among the ordained, rather than the discipline of celibacy. Bishop Wellington de Queiroz…
John L. Allen Jr.
Chai Brady
Peter Costello
Greg Daly