Dear Editor, Greg Daly is to be commended for his analysis as “unsustainable and probably unconstitutional”, the recommendations of the Australian Royal Commission to compel priests to break the seal of Confession where child sexual abuse is disclosed (IC 17/08/2017). His interview with Teresa Devlin, CEO of the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the…

Dear Editor, Someone who opposes abortion and holds to the traditional definition of marriage is immediately branded a ‘social conservative’. Why? If these values ensure the progress of human society into a safe and healthy future, surely that person merits the descriptive noun, ‘progressive’, i.e. ‘forward looking’? Yours etc., Judith Leonard, Raheny, Dublin 6.

Dear Editor, An urgent plea to all, your prayers (especially the Rosary) are asked that we may continue to protect the unborn and that Ireland remains abortion free. There are many people in this country who wish to change the law concerning the Eighth Amendment, which would allow abortion to be carried out in Ireland…

Dear Editor, Mary Kenny is mistaken when she refers to the “strange death of the SDLP” (IC 17/08/2017), because the SDLP is far from dead. Yes, they took a hit in this year’s Westminster election, but that still leaves a substantial group in the Northern Assembly and a sizeable number of councillors. However, longer term…

How to ‘bully-proof’ your kids

Every day children in schools all around the world eat their lunch in toilet cubicles; others spend entire mornings in class silently agonising about who might hang out with them at lunchtime; millions immediately panic when they hear the familiar ping from their mobile and they realise that yet another so-called friend has posted spiteful…

Recent books in brief

Radical & Free: Musings on the Religious Life by Brian O’Leary (Messenger Publications, €10.99) With vocations seemingly in permanent decline, there is a need, some Catholics might feel, for a book of this kind by an experienced lecturer, to explain to a sceptical age where the sources of a religious vocation lie. The answer to the…

Dublin parish celebrates 200 years

Sr Louise O’Brien, Sr Esther & Sr Elma Hurley (Daughters of Charity, Henrietta Street) with Archbishop Diarmuid Martin and Fr Bryan Shortall OFM Cap. after a Mass to celebrate the bicentenary of St Michan’s Church, Halston Street which was followed by a street party.

Blessing of Galway Bay

Fr Conor McDonough OP gives the annual blessing of Galway Bay off the Claddagh near Mutton Island lighthouse. Fr McDonough fi rst blessed the boats and all who sail in them at the pier near St Mary’s Church before the fl eet sailed out for the centuries-old tradition of the Blessing of the Bay. Photo:…