As a child, I was taught that I had a guardian angel, a real angel given me by God to accompany me everywhere and protect me from danger. I remember a pious holy card given to me by my mother, showing a young boy playing dangerously close to the edge of a cliff and an…
Dear Editor, As I listened to what it says in the papers after the news this morning – Saturday, September 25 – I heard it said that so many of our politicians are millionaires. Then later I heard on playback two good ordinary citizens share their sad stories of being asked to vacate their apartments…
From the moment of his election eight years ago, Pope Francis laid down a marker that the Church is not a debating chamber but exists to bring Christ to the world. Speaking the morning after his election he warned the cardinals who had just thrust him to the papacy: “We can walk as much as…
Notebook The recent revelations about the disposal of organs of babies who died at Cork University hospital were deeply troubling for many reasons. The organs of eighteen babies born at the hospital and who were still-born or subsequently died were sent to be incinerated at a facility in Belgium. The story came to light as…
Members of the British royal family are not supposed to get involved in anything political or controversial: but Kate, Duchess of Cambridge, has pointedly supported current campaigns protesting about violence against women. She sent flowers, and tweeted about the horrific murder of the primary schoolteacher, Sabina Nessa, and attended a huge protest about the killing…
The View Quite suddenly it seems to me that we are moving very rapidly towards Christmas – it is just 12 weeks away and the shops are already beginning to offer Christmas decorations and presents! I was pondering on how rapidly time has passed in this strange coronavirus half-world which we have been inhabiting –…
The pandemic has allowed people to reflect on what really matters to them in life, writes David Quinn The pandemic has impacted different groups in different ways. I am not referring to the direct effect of the disease itself, but of lockdown and other restrictions imposed to ensure Covid-19 did not go out of control.…
Letter from Rome US President Joe Biden went before the United Nations September 21 and declared, “We are not seeking a new Cold War, or a world divided into rigid blocs.” The statement became necessary in the wake a week earlier of the new “AUKUS” pact among the US, the UK and Australia, seen precisely…
Barb Fraze As part of the listening and dialogue phase of the Australian Catholic Church’s Plenary Council, 220,000 Australians answered the question, “What do you think God is asking of us in Australia at this time?” In 2015, Australian Archbishop Mark Coleridge was asking himself something similar. Australia was in the midst of a government-mandated…
In Walker Percy’s 1971 novel, Love Among the Ruins, his central character is a psychiatrist named Tom More. Dr More is a Catholic who is no longer practicing his faith, albeit he still believes. This is how he describes his situation: “I believe in God and the whole business but I love women best, music…
Fr Ronald Rolheiser
Michael Kelly
Mary Kenny
Nuala O’Loan
David Quinn
John L. Allen Jr.