The View Pope Francis, meditating recently on the problematic history of Latin America including his own country of Argentina in its evolution over the past 500 years, and especially the treatment of native peoples, ran into criticism from Spanish conservatives. They hold that Spain gave Latin America (except Brazil) its language and Catholic religion, and…
Left-wing pressure groups are lining up to push Ireland in an even more liberal direction, writes David Quinn For many years, various United Nations (UN) bodies exerted pressure on Ireland to abolish the Eighth Amendment. Moves are now on to cajole us into making our present already very liberal abortion law even more permissive. Ireland…
Inviting people to participate in a process that is really only about erecting scaffolding around old structures will further alienate even the enthusiastic, writes Garry O’Sullivan “Trying to turn the pyramid upside down,” is how Fr Brendan Hoban described what they were doing by organising a diocesan assembly in Killala, one of the smallest dioceses…
“To tell someone, with fullness of heart, ‘I love you’, is virtually the same as saying, ‘You shall never die.’ Twentieth century philosopher Gabriel Marcel wrote those words and they echo words written 500 years earlier by Blessed Magdalen Panattieri, a Dominican Tertiary, who wrote to a friend, “I could not be happy in heaven…
Dear Editor, I am a full-time worker with regular hours who doesn’t finish before 5pm, and prior to the pandemic I had little difficulty locating an evening Mass to attend on weekdays. Since the churches have re-opened however, I have found to my dismay that there is now a dearth of evening Masses (7pm-7.30pm) in…
Notebook Dear Sr Lelia, You will be surprised to see this letter which is almost 50 years too late but please bear with me. Last week I participated in a beautiful celebration to mark the 150th anniversary of your congregation, the Sisters of St John of God. This celebration has brought me into something of…
The story is told – probably apocryphally – that in the year 1210 St Francis of Assisi had an audience with Pope Innocent III. During the course of their meeting, both men strolled through the Vatican treasury with all the wealth that this contained at the time as a sure sign of the temporal power…
The event marking partition was always going to be a highwire act from a Catholic point of view, but history will remember the ceremony well, writes Michael Kelly Leaders of the country’s Christian traditions have vowed to face “difficult truth” and work closer together to ensure that the fragile peace process in the North leaves…
In the current James Bond movie – No Time to Die – the villain, name of Safin, is played by an actor showing facial scarring (although Rami Malek’s facial markings are purely the product of the make-up department). And he’s not the first Bond villain to be a ‘scarface’. And it’s certainly unchristian to imply…
The View Campaigns to make euthanasia/assisted suicide legal are underway in both England and Wales, and here in Ireland. The most recent bill was before the House of Lords on Friday. We had just three minutes each to make the case against the bill…a challenge! That was very little time in which to contemplate the…
David Quinn
Fr Ronald Rolheiser
Michael Kelly
Mary Kenny
Nuala O’Loan