The View In recent times, three friends have all told me about people they know who have not been back to Mass in church. They continue to watch online. My friends were both surprised and worried because the people they mentioned were regular Massgoers before the pandemic. Nor had any of the people health concerns…

The View Lack of time prevents me from doing as many talks as I once did (not to mention a worldwide pandemic.) I am not quite sure why I accepted an invitation to speak at the recent Holycross Abbey Novena but I am so glad I did. I was vaguely aware of Holycross Abbey but…

The View Single people have played a very important role in my life, beginning with my much-loved aunt, Kathleen O’Brien, who died at the early age of 71. Kathleen was a fascinating figure to me as a child. She had spent the years of the Second World War in Sweden as, I think, a kind…

The View I missed the movie, Eighth Grade, when it was in cinemas but saw it recently on Netflix. In the US, being in eighth grade is roughly equivalent to second year, a particularly difficult age. Hormones kick in and friendships become complicated. Painful Social media has made being a teenager even more difficult. The protagonist,…

The View A midst the ongoing controversy about whether US President Joe Biden should be excommunicated for his stance on abortion, important points are being missed. There needs to be sustained teaching on the nature of the Eucharist before people will understand excommunication. (This is not to suggest a moratorium on excommunication until all Catholics…

The View Even three years on, many of us are still grieving the repeal of the Eighth Amendment. The grief is not as raw as it once was but it will probably never go away. It is so tempting to give up and to decide that the gulf is unbridgeable. Thankfully, most pro-life activists have settled…

The View Predicting the future is a mug’s game. For example, anyone who predicted in December 2019 that the world would be battling a global pandemic for the following two years would have been encouraged to go and have a little lie-down. The folly of predictions notwithstanding, in the year 2000, I agreed to take…

The View Pope Francis is sometimes controversial but never boring. As John L. Allen of Crux Now put it, the pontiff’s current trip to Iraq is perhaps his most emblematic trip – if only because his stubborn streak ensured that it happened. He ignored worries about super spreader Covid-19 events and security issues in order…

The View It was reported last week that the HSE is to begin vaccinations in religious orders’ congregated settings. The pandemic has taken a terrible toll on nursing homes in general, as pointed out by The Irish Catholic since very early in the first lockdown. However, news about religious orders’ nursing homes and other settings…