One Dublin parish is looking to contemplative prayer as the way forward for faith in Ireland, writes Jason Osborne Balally parish in south Co. Dublin is staking its future on the power of prayer. As the Church wanes in Ireland, parish priest Fr Jim Caffrey and chaplain Fr Dermot Lane insist that the decline in…
Faith in Film I mentioned last week that while the Vatican is an unlikely source of film criticism, it does have its own list of ‘great films’. It’s a list I encourage you to check out, easily found with a quick Google search. Their selection is broken up into three categories, religion, values and art.…
Saint of the Week The Church’s thoughts turn to St Andrew, one of the first apostles of Christ and brother of St Peter, around this time of year, his feast day being November 30. Before meeting Jesus, Andrew was a disciple of John the Baptist – a sure mark in favour of his powers of…
Faith Development Synodal cries for faith development must not go unanswered, writes Jason Osborne One of the key themes to emerge from the Church’s synodal journey so far is the need for comprehensive, ambitious faith formation. Many of those who’ve turned out have expressed a deep desire to better know and understand their faith. At…
Faith Development The Dominican tradition grew out of a desire to know and love the truth, writes Fr Conor McDonough OP Dominican friars, also known as friars preachers, belong to a global movement with roots stretching back to the 13th century. In 1216, in response to widespread confusion in the south of France concerning the…
Saint of the week November 24 sees the Church remember and celebrate 117 martyrs, killed for their commitment to the Catholic Faith in Vietnam between the 17th and 19th Centuries. Fr Andrew Dung-Lac, a priest, gives his name to the feast, and the 116 other martyrs he’s remembered alongside stand in for a multitude. Among…
Faith Development Faith in film Films are, first and foremost, meant to entertain us. We go to the cinema – or more often, watch on our TVs or phones – to laugh and to cry, to be inspired and overawed, to fall in and out of love. But that’s not a film’s only purpose. From…
With COP27 coming to an end, how to care for creation is on more minds than ever, writes Jason Osborne The 2022 United Nations Climate Change conference, COP27, is drawing to a close in Egypt, and whatever else about it, these yearly gatherings continue to spark conversation and debate about how best to address the…
Personal Profile Sometimes we expect a ‘voice from the cloud’ moment when it comes to vocations, according to Fr Dave Twohig O.Carm. But for him, there was no clear line to his own vocation. Instead, it gradually evolved until he realised that he wanted to serve people as a priest. “Believe it or not, that’s…
There are more distractions than ever before and so we must develop our concentration if we’re to thrive, writes Jason Osborne We live in a world awash with distraction. Living in mega-cities (by historical standards) as we do, we’re surrounded by more stimulus every day than your average person was exposed to in a year. A…
Ruadhán Jones