Our society tends to divide us up into winners and losers. Sadly, we don’t often reflect on how this affects our relationships with each other, nor on what it means for us as Christians. What does it mean? In essence, that our relationships with each other tend are too-charged with competition and jealousy because we…

Bro. Conor McDonough Picture the scene: a mid-20th-Century crowd of Irish emigrants in a newsagent’s after Mass. They all rush to buy the ‘Irish papers’ to find out what the important people in Dublin are doing and how the metropolis views the provinces. Then in walks a Monaghan eccentric. He has notions, so maybe he’s…

“We’re all free to hold any political opinion that we like, and to express that opinion”, writes Mary Kenny A young relation of mine in Germany was in touch with me last week saying how much everyone, it seems, in that country really, really dislikes Donald Trump. Although he is no fan of Mr T,…

“It would be more accurate to speak of promotion of the right to cause death”, writes Breda O’Brien The idea that you can gather 100 people together over a number of weekends and that they will come to independent conclusions that are better than those arrived at by elected representatives is an interesting one. It…

Seamus Mulconry CPSMA general secretary Seamus Mulconry addressed the Oireachtas Committee on Education and Skills about the Equal Status (Admissions to Schools) Bill 2016 No Catholic school wishes to exclude any child from the benefits of a Catholic education. In almost 95% of our schools, we take everyone who applies. Our schools are welcoming and…

In respect of denominational schools, Education Minister, Richard Bruton is following in the path of his two immediate Labour predecessors, Jan O’Sullivan and Ruairi Quinn. That is to say, he is investigating ways of reducing the influence of the Churches over our education system, especially at primary school level. That influence, it should be said…

Inés San Martín On February 11, Pope Francis sent an envoy to Medjugorje in Bosnia-Herzegovina, not to rule on the credibility of the alleged Marian apparitions taking place at the site since 1981, but to assist with pastoral issues. Speaking to Crux, a source close to the matter said that Archbishop Henryk Hoser of Warsaw-Prague, Poland,…

“No-one wants them.” Across the plethora of reporting of the plight of Myanmar’s tortured Rohingya community, no single phrase summed up the plight of a people so precisely as that employed by Pope Francis on February 8. During his weekly General Audience, the Pontiff chose to make the despised Muslim minority community the subject of…

In the Hebrew Scriptures, that part of the Bible we call the Old Testament, we find a strong religious challenge to always welcome the stranger, the foreigner. This was emphasised for two reasons: first, because the Jewish people themselves had once been foreigners and immigrants. Their Scriptures kept reminding them not to forget that. Second,…

Bro. Kevin O’Reilly OP A new musical prodigy has appeared in our midst: Alma Deutscher, an 11-year-old English girl, has been causing quite a sensation in the world of classical music. Although she prefers not to be compared with Mozart, it’s difficult not to think in these terms. Hearing is believing when it comes to…