“This inflated language is a signal of the anger. Our families did not commit ‘genocide’: they did, however, contribute to the social mores which produced Tuam and its ilk”, writes Mary Kenny It’s understandable – and right – that most people are deeply distressed and desperately upset about the uncovering of the Tuam babies’ remains.…

The votes have been counted and Northern Ireland is in something of a state of shock. Last week unionists had a 16-seat majority over nationalists in the Assembly. Now, just over a week later nationalism has a total of 39 seats to unionism’s 40 seats. However the DUP, by a majority of one, has more…

It’s all over bar the shouting, so the saying goes. As the Citizens’ Assembly moved last weekend from a session of presentations and questioning to a phase of internal debate towards a final ballot on recommendations to be put to the Oireachtas, it is a fairly safe bet that we have not heard the last…

Investigation of mother and baby homes should proceed apace, writes David Quinn It is very hard, three years after the story first broke, to write again about the Tuam mother and baby home and all the deaths that took place there in the years of its operation from 1925 to 1961. What else is left…

Greg Daly considers the Tuam burials in light of contemporary funeral customs If we are to be horrified by what we are learning about the Tuam Mother and Baby Home, we should probably reserve our anger more for how the infant children of unmarried mothers were treated in life than in death. The Mother and…

The voices led by the Catholic Church in the Philippines against the murderous anti-drug tactics of President Rodrigo Duterte gained an important boost last week. On March 2 the international rights group Human Rights Watch (HRW) released the results of its own ‘sample study’ into the phenomenon of extrajudicial killings being laid at the door…

In a case of ‘better late than never’ President Donald Trump used the occasion of his first major speech to the US Congress to address the wave of anti-Semitism currently afflicting the United States. “Recent threats targeting Jewish community centres and vandalism of Jewish cemeteries…remind us that while we may be a nation divided on…

All things considered, I believe that I grew up with a relatively healthy concept of God. The God of my youth, the God that I was catechised into, was not unduly punishing, arbitrary, or judgmental. He was omnipresent, so that all of our sins were noticed and noted, but, at the end of the day,…

Fr Conor McDonough OP As Catholics we all surely felt our faith was disrespected last month when the comedian David Chambers (‘Blindboy Boatclub’) described the Eucharist as ‘haunted bread’ on The Late Late Show. The celebration of the Eucharist is the raison d’être of the priesthood, so as a newly-ordained priest I felt particularly keenly…

We might fault Desmond Connell for his methods, but we cannot fault his sense of duty, writes David Quinn Commentary on the death of Cardinal Desmond Connell has been dominated, understandably, by the abuse scandals that came to light during his time as Archbishop of Dublin. Who Des Connell was got lost in the commentary.…