Seán Cassin The Irish Embassy in Hanoi has an incisive and challenging comment on its website about Vietnam’s economy. It reads “high rates of malnutrition are often masked by impressive economic development. In Vietnam, stunting still affects almost one in four children, and among ethnic minority groups this reaches almost 40%.” I read on…
A few years ago I was invited by Fr Seán Deegan, a Kiltegan priest, to conduct workshops in the Diocese of Juina in the Mato Grosso, Brazil. This Amazonian diocese has 140,000 Catholics scattered over a region one and a half times the size of Ireland. It has 19 priests, some of whom are on loan.…
Catholics may feel a sense of déjà vu upon reading Querida Amazonia, Pope Francis’ 16,000-word apostolic exhortation concluding the Synod of Bishops for the Amazon. The topic has been the object of speculation and fevered expectations ever since the gathering of prelates that occasioned it concluded last October in Rome. During the summit, debate over the viri…
Matt Sedensky Seminarians walk along a hallway lined with photos of priests in classes who came before them. Some are pious alumni, who have become their teachers and mentors; others climbed the Catholic hierarchy to be become bishops and cardinals. But there are others: Raymond Leneweaver, Class of 1962, subject of at least 14 victims’…
Jay Niles “Jesus, I trust in you. I could score a touchdown or break a leg and never play again. So whatever is supposed to happen on this play, just let it happen.” These are the words of Hale Hentges, a tight end for American football side Washington Redskins, who goes into every NFL game…
We are growing ever more distrustful of words. Everywhere we hear people say: “That’s just talk! That’s nothing but empty words!” Empty words are all around us. Our world is full of lies, of false promises, of glittering advertising that doesn’t deliver, of words never backed up by anything. We trust less and less in…
Notebook Fr Bernard Healy If I were to say Carnevale to you, you might think of the masked celebrations of Venice or the samba-dancing of Rio de Janeiro. However, there was once a time when Rome was also famous for its Carnevale, the festival bidding a farewell to meat before the Lenten fast. Rome’s…
Thirty or 40 years ago when vocations to the priesthood in Ireland were plentiful, the prospect of becoming a bishop probably seemed quite appealing to parish priests – at least to the ambitious ones. The joke was that once a man had been appointed to the episcopate, he would never again eat a bad meal…or…
Dear Editor, In Catholic circles mention the words ‘torchlight procession’ and most will think of Lourdes, southern France, where Our Lady appeared more than a dozen times to a 14-year-old peasant girl, Bernadette Soubirous in 1858. In this little French town since then a public Torchlight Procession takes place every night, with pilgrims from all…
And so it emerges, as I had suspected, that there is no substantial anti-immigrant vote in Ireland. Yes, there is some concern about proportions and numbers in some parts of the country, but there is evidently no traction for an anti-immigrant party – as exists in France, Germany and to some degree in Italy and…
John L. Allen Jr.
Fr Ronald Rolheiser
Michael Kelly
Mary Kenny