Letter from Rome Just a stone’s throw from St Peter’s Square lies the Via delle Fornaci, a major Roman artery that leads from the Vatican all the way up the Janiculum hill. Much of the traffic that flows in and out of the Pope’s domain travels the street, and businesses in the vicinity of the…

by Dennis Sadowski Saying they are outraged by growing “antisemitic rhetoric” across the country, members of the US bishops’ Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs urged Christians to decry hate-filled statements and violence aimed at Jewish individuals, homes and institutions. Committee members also denounced “any rhetoric which seeks to demonise or dehumanise the Jewish people…

by Fr John Harris Notebook On a night out with friends from college I was once asked if I was an optimist or a pessimist; did I see the glass half full or half empty. I had to think about to for a moment. I had to admit I generally see the glass as being…

Under a new protocol, religious symbols across State-run primary and secondary schools in the Republic (see page x), must be reflective of the “entire community”. If I were a Catholic parent with a child at such a school, I’m sure I’d have no objection to a school mirroring the faith diversity of the local community.…

The View Last Saturday night I went with the Families of the Disappeared to Oristown, Co. Meath for a Mass commemorating all those who had been abducted and murdered by the IRA and who are known as ‘the Disappeared’. This is where the bodies of three of those who were abducted and murdered by the…

Politics should not be allowed to invade every sphere, writes David Quinn Perhaps we should be thankful that Ireland did not qualify for the World Cup after all, because if we had, our presence there would have surely unleashed an orgy of hypocritical moralising, virtue-signalling and hand-wringing by all the Irish ‘great and the good’…

Many who entered religious life in my time were emotionally immature, writes Deacon Frank Browne The abuse of children by any adult is a scandal, and the recent revelation regarding the extent of abuse inflicted upon students attending Blackrock College and other Spiritan run schools up to the 1980s, is one of the most serious…

Letter from Rome Just when you think that the Vatican’s “trial of the century” against a cardinal and nine other defendants for various alleged financial crimes can’t get any more surreal, two developments pop out of the woodwork to prove you wrong. A hearing November 24 produced both a previously unknown, and unauthorised, recording of…