The Government has been urged to streamline the process for vetting people to work in schools amidst a huge backlog in the safeguarding system. Changes in the vetting process, to ensure that people are safe to work with children, led to a “very large upsurge” in applications for such clearance, according to Seamus Mulconry General…
Category: News
Sweeter than a rose
Gráinne McElwee, who previously worked with the Council for Catholic Maintained Schools in the diocese of Down and Connor, with her nephew Finn after becoming the newest postulant with the Adoration Sisters on Belfast’s Falls Road.
Dublin parishes ‘vibrant’ – Archbishop Diarmuid Martin
Archbishop Diarmuid Martin has said there is a new “vibrancy” in the parishes of his Archdiocese of Dublin. Interviewed this week on RTÉ Radio’s Today with Seán O’Rourke in the wake of the Irish bishops’ ad limina visit to Pope Francis in Rome, Archbishop Martin was pressed on the question of lower Mass attendances since…
March for life draws huge crowds
Students from the Diocese of Lansing, Michigan hold signs during the annual March for Life in Washington DC on January 27. Photo: CNS
Senator calls for Pope to address Oireachtas in 2018
Fianna Fáil’s Senator Aidan Davitt has called on the Government to invite Pope Francis to address the joint Houses of the Oireachtas during his visit to Ireland in 2018. Senator Davitt said during a radio interview that the Pope’s visit to attend the World Meeting of Families would present “an ideal opportunity” for the Pontiff…
News in Brief
Éamonn Meehan to lead international development network Éamonn Meehan, executive director of the Irish bishops’ aid and development agency Trócaire, has been appointed president of the International Cooperation for Development and Solidarity (CIDSE), the Catholic development network. In accepting the new role, Mr Meehan pledged himself to contributing to the change the world so badly…
Belfast’s Indian community prays for abducted priest
Staff Reporter Members of the Syro-Malabar community in Northern Ireland have offered prayers for the safe release of Fr Tom Uzhunnalil, an Indian Salesian missing in Yemen since he was kidnapped by Islamic extremists last March. Joining with a novena initiated by the Salesian community worldwide, Syro-Malabars attended a day of adoration of the Blessed…
Bishops welcome new schools divestment plan
The Bishops’ Council for Education has offered a welcome for Minister Richard Bruton’s words on religious education in Catholic schools and his proposals for a consultative process on any future divestment of schools. In a statement on behalf of the Council, its chair, Bishop Brendan Kelly said “The Council for Education will study these proposals…
Fr Robert wins praise for ‘tending his flock’
A Mullingar-based priest’s literal interpretation of ‘tending to the flock’ has struck a chord across his rural parish. With farmers working through a busy period of lambing Fr Robert McGivney undertook to bless lambs on the farm of friends in his community, an act which met with such positivity among others that the priest has…
‘Pop’ goes the curate…
Local curate Fr John Carroll gives a hand in the kitchen at a ‘pop up restaurant’ in the curacy of Barntown during a breakfast fundraiser for one of six Mayoral candidates running in the Wexford parish’s charity elections, intended to raise parish funds and involve parishioners more deeply in local Church and community life.