The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity began yesterday (Wednesday) with an official inauguration service at the Church of Ireland parish in Taney in south Dublin. This year the event occurs while the Catholic bishops are in Rome at their ad limina meeting with the Pope, so no Catholic bishops will be present at ecumenical…

The North’s coming election is about a struggle between the two traditions on this island, writes Bishop Donal McKeown Bishop Donal McKeown The entire Brexit project remains a step into the unknown for everybody. Thus we remain unclear as to the possible effects, especially on border counties. But what history tells us is that Belfast,…

Members of the Pro Life Campaign pictured during a demonstration with the group’s latest banner campaign to save the Eighth Amendment protection for the unborn, taking place during the gathering of the Citizens’ Assembly on abortion. Photo courtesy of the Pro Life Campaign.

Priests visiting parishes in other dioceses must show documentation proving they are allowed to minister publicly when saying Masses, the head of the Irish Church’s child protection board has said. Following reports that two priests out of ministry because of abuse allegations had celebrated public Masses, Teresa Devlin, CEO of the National Board for the…

Staff Reporter Growth and decline are top of the agenda for the Irish bishops’ meetings with the Pope and senior Vatican officials next week, according to Archbishop Eamon Martin. This weekend sees Ireland’s bishops travelling to Rome for their first formal collective visit to the Vatican in over 10 years, with fewer than half the…

Glenstal Abbey’s oldest monk has celebrated 80 years as a professed religious. Fr Placid Murray, who is 98 years old and currently lives in a nursing home in Newport, Co. Tipperary, returned to the Limerick monastery to celebrate the Oak Jubilee of his first profession, which he made on the Feast of the Epiphany, 1937.…