In their young lives, adolescents are far more likely to have suffered the worst kind of sexual assault than much older women who have seen far more of life, writes David Quinn There is a widespread idea that as Ireland becomes more liberal, it is almost becoming a kinder, gentler place. The evidence in favour…

The president is clearly not where he should be as a Catholic, but the Pope encourages accompaniment rather than condemnation, writes David Quinn When President Joe Biden was in Ireland last week, there were no reports of him receiving Holy Communion. That meant no bishop or priest here was faced with the potentially very difficult…

The Church needs defenders who will acknowledge its sins while pointing out its many accomplishments, writes David Quinn It is gloves off time now for the critics of the Catholic Church in Ireland. They have gone from rightly attacking the leadership of the Church over their appalling failure to stop clerical sex abuse until the…

There are many sources of meaning and purpose, but without doubt religion is the pre-eminent one, writes David Quinn A new report from the United Nations (UN) reckons that people living in Ireland are the 14th happiest on the planet. The Finns are ranked at number one. The results are to be found in the…

It seems to be a big stretch to claim that the treatment of Joanne Hayes was the result of the social power of the Church writes David Quinn The so-called ‘Kerry babies’ case has been very much back in the news again thanks of the arrest and subsequent release of two people  by gardaí investigating…

Proposals seem designed to weaken the rights of parents in favour of the State, writes David Quinn We look set to have three more referendums later this year, probably in November. We have a Government that can’t get enough of them and is determined to completely recast Ireland in its image. The three come under…

One way or another, we are going to be living in a future that is increasingly dominated by artificial intelligence, writes David Quinn Over the past couple of decades we have already seen how machines such as smartphones and tablets have become so all-pervasive. These are very different from the earlier sorts of machines that…

Is there a deeper existential crisis which social media is making worse, asks David Quinn Ireland is supposed to be the most liberated it has ever been, and yet at the same time we seem to witnessing a surge in mental health problems among young people, especially adolescent girls, and not just in Ireland, but…

Synod can’t cast Christian teachings on marriage into doubt, writes David Quinn Some readers of this newspaper will have taken part in the parish gatherings that are part of a worldwide ‘synodal process’ that is underway at the instruction of Pope Francis. Parish gatherings fed into diocese-level reports, which then fed into a national report.…

Using gendered language for God goes back to Jesus himself, writes David Quinn It was inevitable that one day a concerted effort would be made to introduce gender-neutral language to describe God. It has already been the case in more radical religious circles that the names given to the Three Persons of the Holy Trinity,…