22-year-old Desmond Bane’s recent success in being drafted to the pro-basketball league can be attributed to his faith, according to Mr Bane himself. “It serves as my backbone when things are going great and not going great,” he said. “You always have it to lean on. I wouldn’t be where I am without it,” Mr…
A law to curb religious conversions done by force and fraudulent means was passed amid protests on February 24 in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. The Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Bill, 2020, will replace an ordinance passed last November. The bill has a provision of imprisonment for up to…
Vatican official insists religious services are ‘essential’ For believers, the ability to practice their faith and receive spiritual guidance are “the highest of essential services”, and pandemic practices over the past year have shown they are not automatically super-spreader events, the Vatican foreign minister said. Speaking February 23 during the high-level segment of the UN…
Italian landslide pushes hundreds of coffins into the sea An estimated 200 coffins tumbled from their places in northwest Italy when a landslide destabilised a 100-year-old cliffside cemetery last week. Video emerged on social media which showed emergency response workers in boats searching for the coffins in the waters of Camogli, near Genoa. Two chapels…
Catholic agencies welcome access to Ethiopia’s Tigray region Catholic relief agencies in Ethiopia welcomed a move by the government to allow more access in Tigray where a military operation displaced millions and left an unspecified number of people dead. Amid increased international calls for unrestricted access, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali announced February 24 that…
The Sunday Gospel Fr Silvester O’Flynn OFM Cap. Today we have John’s version of the cleansing of the temple, anticipating the replacement of temple worship by the worship of God through the risen Lord (John 2:13-25). Herod the Great, a man of mixed racial lineage, desiring to ingratiate himself with the Jews decided to build…
Dear Editor, Thank you to Jason Osborne on his timely front-page article ‘Catholic parents voice anger at exclusion from school talks’ [IC 18/02/2021]. In a recent written answer to Sean Canney TD, Education Minister Norma Foley revealed that her civil servants are working with the National Parents Council Post Primary to amalgamate it with the…
Researchers have found that the “desire to die” that is sometimes expressed among elderly people living in community is often “transient” and linked to experiences of loneliness and depression. Longitudinal study The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (Tilda) found that four per cent of 8,100 people aged over 50 expressed a desire to die when…
In the wake of the economic fallout due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the Vatican Secretariat for the Economy said it expects a multimillion-dollar deficit in its budget for 2021. In a statement released February 19, the Vatican said Pope Francis signed off on the Holy See’s 2021 budget, which was proposed by the secretariat and…
Parishes already struggling with debt are under “crippling pressure” to maintain church structures, said the parish priest in Gurranabraher, Cork. Fr Tom Walsh SMA appealed to “committed” and “not-so-committed” parishioners to “come to the aid of churches in need”. He warned that some parishes may not be able to survive the pandemic. “We have seen…