I followed the coverage of Pope Leo’s recent pastoral visit to Paris and was deeply moved by the images coming from the French capital. Who could remain unmoved by the sight of nearly one million people gathered for Mass in the heart of the city? And who could fail to be touched by the sight…
Since the election of Pope Leo people have asked me what I think of the new pope. This is such a modern question. Before the invention of the camera no one knew what the pope looked like, but all Catholics knew they had to be in communion with Rome to be truly Catholic. The martyrs…
In the first week of August, delegates from Dominican Lay Fraternities across Europe gathered at Maynooth College for their four-yearly assembly. Representatives came from 21 countries, stretching from Ireland in the west to Ukraine in the east, and from Norway in the north to Italy in the south. The assembly was formally opened with Mass…
Recently, the people of Cork celebrated the centenary of their annual Eucharistic Procession. The Cork Eucharistic Procession began in 1926, only a few years after the end of the Irish Civil War, and the social and political context of the time is essential to understanding its significance. After the struggle for independence and the bitterness…
At the Provincial Chapter of 2016, the Irish Dominican Province faced a painful but necessary decision. Owing to a lack of vocations over the previous fifty years, it was decided that several communities—both in Ireland and abroad—would have to close. Some of these houses had histories stretching back almost eight centuries. It was a deeply…
Recently, I had the privilege of leading a retreat for English-speaking priests in Assisi during a particularly significant Jubilee year for followers of St Francis. This year marks the 800th anniversary of his death at the Portiuncula, the small chapel at the heart of the first Franciscan community. St Francis died there on the evening…
The Edict of Milan, issued in February 313 by Constantine the Great and Licinius, stands as one of the most decisive turning points in Christian history. By granting religious tolerance throughout the Roman Empire and restoring confiscated Christian property, the edict transformed Christianity from a persecuted minority faith into a legally recognised religion. Its impact…
When we were growing up, my mother always insisted that we didn’t discuss religion or politics at family gatherings. On asking her why, she would say that those subjects always ended up in a row. Of course, she had grown up in the immediate aftermath of the civil war, and politics had divided families and…
When in Rome I spent some time with a group of pilgrims on a ‘pilgrimage of beauty’ centred around the works of Fra Angelico. In preparation for meeting up with them, I visited the Church of San Luigi dei Francesi. I went there with the simple intention of spending a quiet moment before Caravaggio’s famous…
Growing up in Limerick, close by the Dominican church, our go-to saint was St Martin de Porres. So, it was a particularly memorable for me to visit Lima in Peru last week on pilgrimage. Together with another Dominican priest and 35 pilgrims we visited the ‘City of the Kings’, as Lima was known at the…