The Easter season is a call to awareness of the early days of the Church and to be Church in our day. There are countless and powerful stories around healings in the name of Jesus. Difficult stories too, about persecution of those who preached the word and ended up in prison, faced rejection or were…
Category: Opinion
Faith or faiths – which will Charles ‘defend’?
British faith leaders – at the time of writing – were still awaiting the decision as to whether all faiths will be included in the Coronation oath of King Charles III on May 6; or if the Church of England will retain its exclusive control over the ceremony. Charles said, back in 1994, that he…
Time to defend the Church’s legacy against its cultured despisers
The Church needs defenders who will acknowledge its sins while pointing out its many accomplishments, writes David Quinn It is gloves off time now for the critics of the Catholic Church in Ireland. They have gone from rightly attacking the leadership of the Church over their appalling failure to stop clerical sex abuse until the…
Facing the unpleasant realities after the GFA
Good Friday at 25 The View There has been much coverage in the last weeks of the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement. I have not wanted to watch much of it. My abiding memory of the signing of the agreement is that it induced in me a sense of great sorrow and distress…
Peace is deeply spiritual, moral, and religious
Notebook Last Monday, April 10, marked the 25th anniversary of the signing of the Good Friday agreement. This agreement finally brought peace to Northern Ireland after decades of violence and conflict. I was always deeply struck by the timing of when this historic peace agreement was reached – on the day the prince of peace…
Holy Land Christians and holy sites need more protection
Jerusalem is the only city that exists twice: in both heaven and on earth. It has been described as a ‘city of longing’ and it is to this holy city that our hearts and minds turn as we reflect on the drama of Holy Week and Easter. If you’ve ever visited Jerusalem, and I hope…
Robots won’t replace our souls…
We cannot predict the future of humankind, but nevertheless, experts in various fields continue to do so. In recent weeks, the experts at the investment banking empire Goldman Sachs have been telling us that Artificial Intelligence – the rise and rise of robots engineered by computerised science – will erase about 300 million jobs in…
Developing a supernatural focus that changes lives
Things we do every year are familiar, comforting and sometimes, numbing. Lent, Holy Week and Easter are supposed to remind us of the central, astonishing truth of Christianity – God loved us so much that he died for us. Even more astonishing, he then ended the dominion of death by rising. This ought to be…
The synodal journey will take time to involve more people
We should not attempt to water down the Gospel message to make it more attractive today, rather we should live the message unapologetically, writes Bishop Paul Dempsey The results of a poll outlining the current support for our political parties was published recently. The sample of the population polled was 1,102 people (out of a…
UN has blind spot about religion
There are many sources of meaning and purpose, but without doubt religion is the pre-eminent one, writes David Quinn A new report from the United Nations (UN) reckons that people living in Ireland are the 14th happiest on the planet. The Finns are ranked at number one. The results are to be found in the…



Mary Kenny
David Quinn
Nuala O’Loan

Michael Kelly

Breda O'Brien

