Study suggests vaccine protection wanes after 6 months The protection provided by two doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech and the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccines starts to wane within six months, new research suggests. A reasonable worst-case scenario could see protection fall to below 50% for the elderly and healthcare workers by winter, an expert has said. The…
Dear Editor, The events in Afghanistan are tragic to say the least, the future of the population, especially women and girls is shrouded in doubt. Their future under the Taliban, whether that be access to education, the workforce and other basic freedoms is under threat. It is not only women, but all those seen to…
Archbishop Michael Neary has appealed to priests not to lose heart, despite the fact that their pastoral ministry has been curtailed by Covid-19 restrictions. Speaking as the Tuam priests gathered for their delayed Chrism Mass, Dr Neary insisted that “to lose heart would be to forget the treasure with which we have been entrusted and…
The Church must reach out and be prepared to be more of a community than a building, writes Dr Gladys Ganiel Archbishop of Dublin Dermot Farrell has made headlines with his assertion that “evidence of Christian belief in Ireland today has for all intents and purposes vanished”. Dr Farrell made the comments in an interview…
Fr Ignatius McQuillan, who secretly played for Fermanagh after his ordination, has died aged 90. Fr Iggy – as he was known – was a county footballer at the time of his ordination in 1955. As was customary at the time, he was asked to cease his career, but he continued playing under the name…
Afghanistan’s terrified Christians are bracing for a new round of persecution in the wake of the Taliban’s takeover of the country, Christian leaders and aid organisations warn. “We are telling people to stay in their houses because going out now is too dangerous,” one Afghani Christian leader told the aid organisation International Christian Concern (ICC.)…
Promoting a truth recovery process without fear of prosecution would provide information to the many unanswered questions of victims and their families in the North, writes Fr Aloysius G. Lumala The role of the Church in peace-making and reconciliation is based on the fact that social and political disturbances in society contradict the most fundamental…
Caritas Pakistan has alerted its diocesan units bordering neighbouring Afghanistan to help refugees fleeing the Taliban’s takeover of the country, reported ucanews.com. Thousands of Afghans have entered Pakistan via the Chaman border crossing, one of the most active trade and travel routes between the countries, according to media reports. However, Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmad…
German bishops are concerned that a decision guaranteeing German health insurers will pay for pregnant women’s blood tests to detect Down syndrome will lead to abortion. Matthias Kopp, spokesman for the German bishops, said that already about 90% of cases in which an embryo has an extra chromosome result in termination of pregnancy, reported news agency KNA.…
Dublin archdiocese yesterday launched the ‘Families walking together in hope’ initiative, which provides “simple” and “achievable” ideas for families and parishes in support of the Faith in the home and parish. “The ‘family of families’ (parish) will be encouraged to reconnect the ‘holy’ to the home by suggesting rituals of faith in the home with…