Letter from Rome World Youth Day, a massive gathering of young people from around the world that’s become something like the Woodstock of the Catholic Church, was founded in 1985 for young people. Spokespersons say the January 2019 edition in Panama, however, also will be organised by young people themselves. Among the novelties the…
Though a sprawling network of Catholic activists, usually featuring determined members of women’s religious orders, are helping to lead today’s social and humanitarian crusade against human trafficking and modern-day slavery, they know they need the unique resources and powers of governments to turn the tide. A Rome summit on consumerism has suggested that at least…
Information technology and social media aren’t my mother tongue. I’m a digital immigrant. I wasn’t born into the world of information technology but migrated into it, piece-meal. I first lived in some foreign territories. I was nine years old before I lived with electricity. I had seen it before; but neither our home, our school,…
Disappointment is a fact of life for nearly everyone who lives on this planet. It’s simply part of the human condition. We are occasionally disappointed in friends and family, and by people in the other circles in which we move — including our parish. Priests can be disappointed when the parish they are moved to…
The report issued this week by the HSE on the harm that alcohol abuse does to others is described as “new”. ‘The Untold Story: Harms Experienced in the Irish Population Due to Others’ Drinking’ is to be welcomed, but its contents are anything but new, and anything but untold. The same message could have been…
Politicians are forcing their views on the Church, writes David Quinn Liberalism is an extremely aggressive and domineering ideology. In the name of ‘tolerance’ and ‘inclusion’, it intimidates opponents into submission by denouncing them as ‘bigots’ and ‘haters’. Like Christianity when it was politically and socially very powerful, liberalism will brook no rivals. It…
Government involvement in the Amnesty repeal launch glosses over the organisation’s flouting of Irish law, writes Greg Daly Amnesty International Ireland may have fallen foul of the State’s ethics watchdog, but that hasn’t stopped Health Minister Simon Harris from endorsing the organisation in its campaign to remove Ireland’s constitutional protections for the unborn. Such,…
Moral outrage is the antithesis of morality. Yet it’s everywhere present in our world today and is everywhere rationalised on the basis of God and truth. We live in a world awash in moral outrage. Everywhere individuals and groups are indignant and morally outraged, sometimes violently so, by opposing individuals, groups, ideologies, moral positions, ecclesiologies,…
Fr Bernard Healy The Notebook I was lucky enough to spend a few days in Jerusalem this spring. Whilst there, I was able to visit a site sacred to our Jewish brethren, namely the Western (or Wailing) Wall. The Wall stands as a visible reminder of the destruction of the Jewish Temple by the…
It’s six months now since I was obliged to leave the lovely old flat in central Dublin which I had rented for 21 years. It was on the second floor of an old Georgian building and I loved it. It was full of books and old things, nooks and crannies, memorabilia and memories and I…
John L. Allen Jr.
Fr Ronald Rolheiser
Mary Kenny
David Quinn
Greg Daly