Iraqi children who escaped fi erce fi ghting in Mosul rest on the ground October 20 upon reaching the Syrian border near Hassakeh. Photo: CNS

Staff reporter A Vatican-based drama due to air on Irish screens today, October 27, has drawn record numbers in Italy where it debuted last week. According to Sky, the first two episodes of The Young Pope, starring Jude Law, drew some 935,000 viewers, a record for the channel in Italy. Putting the numbers in context, they…

Ruth McGee with Fr Gabriel Harty OP and Brid Galligan, Principal of St Malachy's Girls' National School. Sixth-class student Ruth wrote to Pope Francis to praise the 95-year-old school chaplain Fr Harty, and was amazed last week to receive a letter from the Vatican, saying the Pope wanted to thank her, and that he appreciated…

Bishops launch prayer day for Middle East peace Ireland’s bishops have extended an invitation to all the faithful to pray with them, and Pope Francis, this October 31 for peace in the Middle East, and especially for the people of Syria. Co-organised by the Catholic Church, Caritas International and the Lutheran World Federation – as Pope Francis travels to Sweden – the…

Staff Reporter The Catholic Church prefers that Catholics are buried rather than cremated, according to a major new Vatican document. The instruction – which Pope Francis ordered to be published this week – also says that where Catholics are cremated, the ashes are to be kept in “sacred places”, not at home, divided among family…

Digital technology has caught up with a decades-long Bible project to make a hardcopy version of the work downloadable to mobile phones. According to researchers at the University of Navarra in Spain, a version of the Bible in Spanish, complete with commentary and explanations has taken 30 years to complete in the traditional bound volume…

Catholics should consider how to share the Church’s teaching on the family ahead of the World Meeting of Families, Armagh’s Archbishop Eamon Martin has said. Speaking in St Patrick’s College, Drumcondra, at the formal launch of preparations for the ninth world meeting, which will take place in Dublin in August 2018, the archbishop said the…

A new book on the legacy of Irish missionaries has been launched in time for Mission Month.  The Legacy of Irish Missionaries Lives On contains numerous views and perspectives by leaders of Church and state, academics, historians, diplomats, media personnel, and international development specialists who have experienced the work of Irish missionaries, while also recording…

Dublin was the setting for a major conference on faith schools and their continuing relevance, organised by The Irish Catholic and St Mary’s University, Twickenham

The bells of Christian churches in Northern Iraq have begun to ring out for the first time in over two years as government forces liberate villages and towns around besieged Mosul. As a means of simultaneously signalling freedom regained and of the endurance of Christian communities, bells began to ring out last weekend as militants…