The Philippines’ bishops’ conference has announced it will dedicate 2019 as the ‘Year of the Youth’. The year-long celebration which will start on the first Sunday of Advent on December 2, will carry the theme ‘Filipino Youth in Mission: Beloved, Gifted, Empowered’. Its observance, which the bishops described as part of the “nine-year journey for New…
Labour leader Brendan Howlin has vowed to keep up pressure on the Government to grant asylum to persecuted Pakistani Christian Asia Bibi and her family. Mrs Bibi is being held at a secret location in Pakistan after she was freed from prison when her conviction for blasphemy was overturned and she was spared the death…
Relics of St Brigid to be venerated at ‘Red Wednesday’ Aid to the Church in need invites parishioners to set aside Wednesday, November 28 to light up churches and wear something red to remember Christian martyrs and those who have died for their faith. On that day, St Malachy’s Church, Armagh will be lit up red and people are asked to wear something red…
Antrim parish to hold ‘Prayers Matter’ to deepen Faith An Antrim parish will hold its sixth annual round table gathering on ‘Prayers Matter’ with speakers including Baroness Nuala O’Loan, Sr Elaine Kelly from the Adoration Convent in Belfast and PP Fr Patrick Delargy. The event takes place in All Saints’ Parish Centre, Cushendall Road, Ballymena, on Saturday, December 1 from 2-5.30pm. Sr Elaine…
Vatican opens doors to Russian ‘spiritual’ masterpieces for show In an example of the “diplomacy of art”, the Vatican has inaugurated a landmark exhibit of “spiritual” masterpieces from Moscow’s famed Tretyakov Gallery and other Russian state galleries. Some of the pieces, particularly a number of precious icons, have never been shown before outside of their home galleries, Barbara Jatta, director of the Vatican…
Hannah Brockhaus People need the mercy of God and the healing of the Holy Spirit to root out the sin in their lives – they cannot do it on their own, Pope Francis said at the general audience today. “It is useless to think of being able to correct oneself without the gift of…
Parishioners should stand up for hundreds of millions of persecuted Christians by ‘turning their churches red’ later this month, Irish bishops have said. “On Red Wednesday, we remember the horrific reality of religious violence and intolerance in our world and we state definitively that those who do not respect freedom of thought, conscience and religion…
The beginning of an inquest into the shooting of 10 innocent people during the Ballymurphy Massacre is the “first step on the road to justice” according to campaigners. The inquest began in Belfast on Monday, with relatives of the victims gathering outside the Laganside Court and holding pictures of their loved ones. Ballymurphy parish priest…
The teaching of Limbo was a well-meaning attempt to solve a theological problem but caused many mothers to suffer, a leading theologian has said. Prof. Eamonn Conway, a lecturer at Limerick’s Mary Immaculate College, said the theological concept “caused a lot of harm”, and that it was an attempted solution to protect the idea that…
One of Ireland’s most popular singers has launched a charity single for the Christmas market after making a 20,000km round-trip to record it. Multi-award winning Tommy Fleming travelled to Rwanda to record ‘Give A Little Bit’ – the 1977 hit by Supertramp – with local teenagers in support of Irish aid agency Bóthar’s Christmas appeal.…
Greg Daly
Chai Brady
Colm Fitzpatrick