Now is the time for priests and people to plan creatively for a future together, writes Fr Gareth Byrne Unprecedented change is coming in the Archdiocese of Dublin. In April 2021, Archbishop Dermot Farrell formed a taskforce under the title Building Hope. The archbishop asked the Building Hope taskforce to assess the needs of the…
MASKWACIS, Alberta – the first step of Pope Francis’ “penitential pilgrimage” to Canada involved him returning two pairs of children’s moccasins. The little shoes were not among the Indigenous artifacts held in the Vatican Museums, but rather reminders that Chief Marie-Anne Day Walker-Pelletier of the Okanese First Nation in Saskatchewan had left with Pope Francis…
The Belgian theologian Jan Walgrave, who directed my doctoral thesis, was a true intellectual and a rare one. True, in that his thought naturally, instinctually gravitated towards the huge philosophical questions of essence and existence. Why are we here? Who are we really? Moreover, he was also a rare intellectual in that he was an uncommon…
‘Family Love – a Vocation and a Path to Holiness’ was the theme of the Tenth World Meeting of Families that took place in Rome recently from June 22 to 26. Here I would like to reflect on one aspect of this theme, namely the family as both having a vocation but also being the…
One of the remarkable aspects of the recent tussle for power and leadership in the British Conservative party has been the number of candidates from an ethnic background. Rishi Sunak, former Chancellor and always the front-runner to replace Boris Johnson, is from an Indian heritage; while a rising star, Kemi Badenoch comes from a Nigerian…
The View Most parents of children with disabilities will tell you that they’ve been forced to fight hard to obtain the services their children need to develop their full potential. Despite repeated claims by the State that their objective is to ensure that no child gets left behind, advocates for people with disabilities point to…
Maybe teaching children something about pornography is inevitable and necessary, writes David Quinn Pornography will now be studied as part of a new Relationships and Sexuality Education programme to the taught at Junior Certificate level in the country’s secondary schools. That is the latest diktat from the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) that…
A new publication by the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy for Life has drawn criticism over contributions from some theologians arguing for a distinction between moral norms, such as the Church’s condemnation of artificial birth control, and the pastoral application of those norms in concrete circumstances. Basically, the suggestion seemed to be that in some limited circumstances,…
Despite the popular appeal of Pope Francis, the vast majority of Irish Catholics ignored the synodal consultation process, writes Fr Andrew McMahon Appreciation is due to this newspaper for its recent Synodal Times, outlining the contents of the various diocesan synodal syntheses. From figures contained within the summaries, the participation/response rate per diocese appears to…
Pope Francis said all the speeches he has prepared for his trip to Canada “begin and end” with asking forgiveness. In an early July interview, he acknowledged the “cruel way” the Catholic Church collaborated with the Canadian government in “colonisation” by uprooting Indigenous children from their families, cultures and spiritualities and forcing them to attend…
Fr Ronald Rolheiser
Mary Kenny
David Quinn
John L. Allen Jr.