The Church’s mission is to care for the vulnerable and stand against a culture that seeks to make euthanasia socially acceptable, according to the auxiliary bishop of Armagh. In response to Pope Francis’ message for the World Day of the Sick, which takes place on February 11, Bishop Michael Router said that for some, “illness…
Fermanagh-based priest Fr Joe McVeigh has said that the promotion of Stephen Fulton to grand master in the Orange Order shows “bad form” as the country grapples with violence against women and girls. The appointment of Mr Fulton as district master of Cookstown generated outrage after it emerged that he has a conviction for killing…
Authorities in the UK have dropped charges against a woman arrested for silent prayer in a “buffer zone” that bans pro-life advocacy outside an English abortion clinic. However, Isabel Vaughan-Spruce says the charges still could be revived, leaving her in an ambiguous legal situation. “It can’t be right that I was arrested and made a…
The slow divestment of Catholic schools is down to local demand and not the Church, a senior official in the Department of Education has said. The reconfiguration of school patronage is a “slow burner”, Mr Hubert Loftus told the Joint Oireachtas Committee for Education and Skills. However, he added that this “is not necessarily because…
American actor Shia LaBeouf has appeared in a viral clip in which he speaks about how there aren’t enough joyful depictions of Christ on the cross. “You know, the story of Christ is that God became man for our betterment,” Mr LaBeouf, 36, says in the clip, continuing, “so that means he is the ultimate…
The Catholic Church in Sydney bid farewell to its former archbishop, Cardinal George Pell, in a funeral at times solemn, reverent, defiant and sorrowful, shot through with wry Australian humour, and attended by mourners from all walks of life. The cardinal remained a sign of contradiction until the very end, with protesters’ shouts of “George…
Archbishop Eamon Martin has paid tribute to Deacon Martin Barlow, who died recently aged 54. Deacon Barlow, who was one of the first married men to be ordained to the diaconate in Armagh, died just four weeks after being diagnosed with cancer. His funeral Mass was held on Monday in St John the Baptist Church,…
A Belgian television station has rediscovered a 20-minute video in which Fr Georges Lemaitre, considered the father of the Big Bang theory, explains what the origin of the universe may have been like. Fr Lemaitre was a Belgian astrophysicist known for being the first academic to propose the theory of the expansion of the universe…
“Tragically, religious freedom for many is increasingly under assault around the world,” Rep. Michael McCaul said at the International Religious Freedom (IRF) Summit, which took place in Washington, DC, last week. Faith leaders from across the world – including Catholics, Muslims, Jews, Hindus and others – gathered at the summit to address the ongoing persecution…
Irish healthcare services would be “much better” if there were more of the Catholic ethos today, an independent senator has said. Responding to the revelation that 95% of parents whose babies are diagnosed with Down’s syndrome at the Rotunda Hospital choose to have an abortion, Senator Rónán Mullen said that “something has happened in our…
Chai Brady
Ruadhán Jones