The uniqueness of St Patrick

This Sunday the whole world, it seems, will for a few hours become Irish, or at least recover enough of their nominal ‘Irishness’ to join in the fun. President Biden, in the name of the American people, will accept yet again a giant bowl of flourishing shamrock, and avow his Irish roots. Streets around the…

A Dublin celebration of the Irish Diaspora

St Patrick’s day sees the arrival of great numbers of visitors from abroad, many of them part of, or deeply interested in the Irish diaspora.   This seems an appropriate moment then to visit the EPIC presentation down on Customs House in the Dublin Financial Centre. EPIC stands for Irish Emigration Museum, by the way. This is…

Reading in Lent: a different approach

Even for those who, as they say these days, ‘are not religious’, reading the New Testament is an experience which few set themselves to have. I also believe people should, in this day and age, have some acquaintance with the Torah and the Quran, and try to understand what they mean to Jews and Muslims,…

A book to enlighten your Lenten reading

Recently Fr Timothy Radcliffe OP was in Dublin to give the annual Patrick Finn Lecture at St Mary’s, Haddington Road. It was an opportunity which many took to hear one of the more influential Catholic theologians of today. It was judged by those who attended to have been a great success.  Those who might wish…

On retreat with Pope Francis

  One would have thought that every possible literary item from the present pope’s early years would have been brought to our notice. But this seems not to be the case, for here is a book, brought to us from those days in Argentina which will arouse great interest.   How it came to be written…