WMOF 2018 With just under four months to go until the opening of the World Meeting of Families 2018 in Dublin, the organising team has just announced another registration milestone with more than 17,000 people now registered for the Pastoral Congress which will take place in the RDS, Dublin from 22-24 August. Figures show…
Make My House a House of Prayer: Reflections on the Family Rosary by Gabriel Harty OP (Veritas, €3.99) This little book is by a veteran Dominican priest now in his 90s. Known as ‘the Irish Rosary Priest’, he has passed his vocation establishing prayer groups all over Ireland. The key element of his new publication is…
Young people in Europe need political support to start families in countries with aging populations, a Catholic campaign group has said. While “young people want to form lasting relationships and have children,” they “don’t feel safe” to start families, said Antoine Renard, president of the Brussels-based Federation of Catholic Family Associations in Europe. “Unless something…
A conservative member of parliament has blocked a motion calling on the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops to invite Pope Francis to apologise for the Church’s role in abuse at Indian residential schools. However, Charlie Angus, a member of parliament, said the motion would come up for debate and a vote in the coming weeks.…
The Church paved the way for the republican victory in Ireland’s 1918 general election, writes Gabriel Doherty As turning points in Irish history go, the ‘conscription crisis’ that enveloped Ireland a century ago in the spring of 1918 was perhaps second only to the Easter Rising in terms of its impact upon public sentiment…
Catholic majority in NI predicted Catholics could outnumber Protestants in Northern Ireland by 2021, a leading academic has suggested. The 2011 official census figures put the Protestant population at 48 per cent and Catholics at 45 per cent, while more recent figures from 2016 show 44 per cent of working age adults are Catholic and 40 per cent Protestant. Paul Nolan, an independent researcher, best known for…
Kerry sci-fi festival Families often debate about what movie is the greatest of all, and more often than not, Star Wars is part of the list. It’s good news for fans of the movie then, as it will be theme of a céilí in Portmagee’s village square, Kerry, over May 4-6. The Fáilte Ireland initiative…
Dear Editor, Marie Collins’ recommendation that clerics who have misled Pope Francis around abuse and cover-up in Chile should be removed from office (IC 19/4/2018) makes perfect sense. At this stage, it is hard to see how anything else could constitute a genuine commitment to the cause of zero tolerance in the field of child…
Pope call s German cardinal to Rome to discuss eucharistic sharing Pope Francis has asked the president of the German bishops’ conference to come to Rome to discuss pastoral guidelines for possibly allowing some non-Catholics married to Catholics to receive the Eucharist, the conference spokesman has said. Reports that “the document was rejected in the Vatican by the Holy Father or by the dicasteries…
Mothers and fathers who consider abortion in difficult circumstances should be treated with “tremendous sensitivity and support”, an Irish bishop has said. In an April 22 Pastoral Message, Fern’s bishop Dennis Brennan said that individuals can find themselves in difficulties during pregnancy, pointing out that mothers may be abandoned, afraid, isolated or facing financial and…