The new year finds Mexico still seeking a new reality, writes Paul Keenan

The numbers of Catholics worldwide – lay, clerical and religious – has increased by 15 million, according to the latest figures made available by the Vatican. This week the Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae, updated to December 31, 2012, was presented to Pope Francis, along with the Pontifical Yearbook 2014. It showed that the Americas and Africa…

An award-winning Irish composer who has written the score for a blockbuster film about Mother Teresa has said the movie will move audiences to tears. Ciaran Hope, a native of Dunboyne, Co. Meath, who has been based in the US for 15 years, has spent the past year composing music for The Letters. The Hollywood…

Last year saw an increase in the number of Church personnel killed in the service of their community. According to Fides, the news agency of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples, 26 pastoral workers were killed in 2014 – three more than in the previous year. The agency’s annual report states that 17 priests,…

Likely that Ireland will not see appointment of new cardinal until at least 2019, when Dr Brady turns 80

The Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry in the North heard this week that a religious order accepted that notorious paedophile priest Brendan Smyth abused children in their care. The inquiry is currently examining abuse claims at Nazareth House and Nazareth Lodge. Senior counsel to the inquiry, Christine Smith QC, read a statement from Sr Brenda McCall…

The Pro Life Campaign (PLC) has warned that a forum to examine Ireland’s abortion law would be a set of “pretend hearings” with a “pre-arranged outcome”. The PLC was responding to a call by Fine Gael TD Jerry Buttimer for an abortion forum to be established to examine Ireland’s law on the matter. “What Deputy…

One of the largest Catholic universities in the US is to set to establish a campus in the coastal town of Dingle, Co. Kerry. The new venture between Sacred Heart University (SHU) in Connecticut, University College Cork (UCC), Cork Institute of Technology (CIT) and the Institute of Technology Tralee (ITT) is the first of its…

Des Fisher’s ‘incisive’ work gave Irish Catholics an insight into the momentous event that was Vatican II, writes Michael Kelly

A Christian missionary from Cookstown, Co. Tyrone, was shot in her home in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) during a robbery at the weekend. Maud Kells (75), a missionary with the Christian group WEC International, is in a stable condition in hospital after being shot twice and wounded in the shoulder. Ms Kells, who…