Australian Cardinal George Pell has provided full passport details to disprove allegations that have been made against him. Paul Lyons, a 55-year-old survivor of sexual abuse by Robert Best, a member of the Christian Brothers has claimed that in 1969 Dr Pell, who was then a young priest, heard him pleading for help some weeks…

Top weather forecaster believes in the power of prayer

The enactment of a Kansas law intended to stop the abortion by dismemberment of human fetuses during their second trimester has been temporarily stopped by the courts. Shawnee County District Court judge Larry Hendricks has granted a temporary injunction against the US state’s Unborn Child Protection from Dismemberment Abortion Act, which was to go into…

Staff reporter Pope Francis will address a joint session of the US Congress, the first Pope to do so, on his much anticipated September 19-27 trip to Cuba and the United States and will meet Cuban president Raul Castro in Havana, the Vatican has confirmed. His itinerary includes stops in Havana, where he meets Castro…

The Maronite Archbishop of Damascus has written to Aid to the Church in Need, pleading for help in the face of the deteriorating situation in Syria. In a letter entitled ‘From Anxiety to Hope’, Archbishop Samir Nassar says that it seems that the Syrian crisis is “the cruellest human drama since the Second World War”.…

Fr Michael Toner, parish priest of Eglish in Co. Tyrone, presents Pope Francis with an Eglsih GAA jersey during a visit to the Vatican.

The Maronite Archbishop of Damascus has written to Aid to the Church in Need, pleading for help in the face of the deteriorating situation in Syria. In a letter entitled ‘From Anxiety to Hope’, Archbishop Samir Nassar says that it seems that the Syrian crisis is “the cruellest human drama since the Second World War”.…

A leading pro-life campaigner in the North has been successful in her appeal against being convicted of harassing a former Marie Stopes clinic director. The case against Bernadette Smyth, founder and director of Precious Life, was thrown out after a judge ruled there was insufficient evidence that she pursued a campaign against Dawn Purvis. On…

Environmental activists hold banners after attending Pope Francis' Angelus in St Peter's Square at the Vatican June 28. Some 1,500 people marched to the Vatican in support of Pope Francis' recent encyclical on the environment. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

Pupils from Ballinora National School in Cork, who for three years have been donating money given them at their Confirmations and money raised from cake sales to plant hundreds of plants and flowers at Marymount Hospice. Principal Mícheál Ó Draighneáin told The Irish Catholic that the exercise is a “concrete manifestation of themes in the…