Did Padre Pio’s intercession save a 
family of seven, asks 
Chai Brady   In a near-death experience a holidaying Irish family of seven crashed onto a motorway after losing control of their car in the US. Tumbling down an embankment after swerving to avoid another motorist, Cavan man Martin McBreen said the accident could have…

Colm Fitzpatrick speaks with the director of an Irish St Pio charity   With devotion to Padre Pio still continuing to grow, one woman is providing an opportunity for people globally to learn more about the incredible work of this modern saint. Eileen McGuire, who is the director of the Irish Office of St Pio…

Padre Pio’s path to acceptance in the Church was far from a smooth one, writes Greg Daly   When Padre Pio was canonised by Pope St John Paul II in June 2002 before a crowd of 300,000 people it seemed in some ways almost a formality. The path to Padre Pio’s beatification just three years…

It was with good reason 
that Padre Pio’s Mass drew huge crowds, according to 
Fr Francesco Napolitano   Padre Pio’s life on earth was in perpetual union with God; all of his letters give valid evidence of this. In a letter written to his spiritual director, Fr Benedetto of San Marco in Lamis, on September…

First and foremost, Padre Pio was a simple friar, writes Fr Bryan Shortall   Padre Pio was asked once who are you? He replied: “I’m just a poor friar who prays.” I’ve no doubt that he would prefer to be remembered for this rather than all his supernatural gifts. Many years ago, one of our…

Eucharist is essential food for the daily journeys of a group of sisters, writes Susan Gately   The Servant Sisters of the Home of the Mother, dressed in white habits, arrived in Roscommon town last May. “People are very open and friendly. They meet us on the streets and beep their horns at us because most…

The St Patrick of popular lore was the creation of the 7th-Century Church,  writes Thomas O’Loughlin   Memory is our key both to the past and to our identity, and we are usually fairly certain about the overall architecture of the edifice known as ‘our story’. Turning to Patrick – a crucial figure in Irish…

Text of keynote address by Mary McAleese, President of Ireland 1997-2011, at the Voices of Faith International Women’s Day Conference. Theme: Why women matter. 
March 8, 2018 at the Jesuit Curia, Rome   “Historical oppression of women has deprived the human race of untold resources, true progress for women cannot fail to liberate enormous reserves…

Visitors to the Chester Beatty Library have a chance to 
see one of the city’s religious and artistic treasures, 
writes Greg Daly   Today’s Divine Office is a simpler set of prayers than that which previous generations of Catholics were faced. Putting forward a new revised Liturgy of the Hours in 1970, Pope Paul VI…