Brazil’s bishops host national presidential debate on variety of topics
Canadian bishops to launch national strategy to combat euthanasia
New campaign for palliative care and against euthanasia
Both sides fire over Communion for divorced, remarried
Prominent bishops publicly debating controversial topics
Pope’s advisers start first draft toward document overhauling Vatican
Pope Francis’ international Council of Cardinals has begun major reform of the Vatican bureaucracy
Pope advances causes of Canadian nun, Indian ‘apostle of Sri Lanka’
Pope Francis advanced the sainthood causes of four men and women
Savita’s death misused by politicians and media
Dear Editor, The tragic death of Savita Halappanavar in Galway Hospital in 2012 was massively misused by politicians and the media who were more concerned with using her death to force abortion legislation into Ireland, rather than find out the truth about why she died. Now, almost two years later and after a lengthy investigation,…
On the issue of women deacons
Dear Editor, Regarding the question of the diaconate for women, it might be of interest to know what St Edith Stein had to say on the subject. Edith Stein was a Jewish Carmelite who was gassed at Auschwitz on August 9, 1942. She wrote: “The early Church gave outlet for the manifold activity of women…
Bishop right to demand answers
Dear Editor, I think Bishop Martin Drennan was quite in order to demand answers from the SVP (‘Bishop demands answers from SVP on gay donation’ IC 04/09/2014). I always thought the SVP looked after the poor in their different needs, paying ESB bills, school uniforms and maybe groceries, etc. The poor bishops – they are…
The unpopular nature of judgment
Dear Editor, I applaud the courage of Bishop Martin Drennan for his censure of the St Augustine’s Conference of the St Vincent De Paul society in Galway, for donating money to the LGBT group Amach Ltd (IC 04/09/2014). He is taking the very type of unpopular stance that often characterises public Christian witness. Those who…
Deacons don’t replace lay parish volunteers
Dear Editor, I find the opposition to deacons hard to understand. I live in the UK and we have had married deacons for the last 40 years. Ordained deacons are usually married men with a family, so there is no chance they will take over functions presently undertaken by lay people. Even if they wanted…

Mags Gargan