The Notebook I suspect very few people would choose Ash Wednesday as one of their favourite days of the year. I have to admit that in recent times the first day of Lent has become a day I do look forward to. A number of years ago, together with my colleague from the neighbouring…
Revolutions don’t always happen with riots in the streets, or even ordered declarations of a new national order. Revolutions sometimes take place quietly, when nobody is paying attention, or by slow, gradual, incremental change. Back in 1989, a revolution began which none of us even knew about. Sir Tim Berners-Lee, a British engineer and computer…
The View There are billboards for Hozier’s new album, Wasteland, Baby!, all over the place. In a Guardian Question and Answer session the singer (Andrew Hozier-Byrne) revealed that he has Seamus Heaney’s last words tattooed on his arm. Seamus Heaney had texted ‘noli timere’ which means, “do not be afraid”, to his wife, Marie,…
Good and evil are things we actively choose, writes David Quinn Fr Pat Collins wants us to confront a very uncomfortable thought: evil is real. In the West, we often like to pretend that evil does not exist, or if it does, can be reduced to psychological categories. In his new book, Freedom from…
Letter from Rome Elise Harris This year’s Roman celebration of International Women’s Day happened to fall in a moment when Pope Francis has been drawing some fire over women’s issues, in part for using allegedly sexist language during a recent sex abuse summit and also for a perceived lack of progress on his repeated…
Whatever else Pope Francis’ decision on Monday, March 4 to open the archives from the pontificate of Pius XII in 2020 may mean, there’s one preliminary conclusion that seems take-it-to-the-bank, no-doubt-about-it, slam-dunk certain. Here it is: opening the archives will not – indeed, by definition, cannot – settle the historical controversy about Pius XII and…
What’s to be learned through failure, through being humbled by our own faults? Generally that’s the only way we grow. In being humbled by our own inadequacies we learn those lessons in life that we are deaf to when we are strutting in confidence and pride. There are secrets, says John Updike, which are hidden…
The Notebook Fr Vincent Sherlock I listened to ‘The Deer’s Cry’ in the house before Mass. It is a favourite of mine and I thought that I might play it at Holy Communion time if there was no choir. There was no choir, so I left the phone on the altar, moved the microphone…
Many educationalists are very much opposed to the decision to drop history and geography from the junior curriculum. On history, many a wise philosopher has said that we cannot know where we are going until we know where we came from. “Those who do not learn from the past,” said George Santayana, “are doomed to…
Barring Christian taxpayers’ taxes from being spent on Christian institutions attacks civil society, writes David Quinn Will Catholic hospitals soon be prevented from putting religious symbols such as crosses on public display? That appeared to be the suggestion of a report commissioned by the Government. The Government asked Catherine Day, former secretary general of…
Mary Kenny
Breda O'Brien
David Quinn
John L. Allen Jr.
Fr Ronald Rolheiser