The alignment of a coffin before the altar tells its own story. I celebrated a funeral Mass for a priest during the month — not that many who attended were aware of this man’s one-time status. He had trained and been ordained by a religious community I had never heard of, in another country, and…
Ever felt like cutting off all contact with your family? There’s a slew of self-help books currently published which encourage individuals to do just that. These bear such titles as ‘The Power of Parting: Finding Peace and Freedom Through Family Estrangement, by Eamon Dolan; Surviving the Toxic Family by Marina Williams; Rules of Estrangement –…
It has been said that the leaders of tomorrow are in today’s classrooms. Assuming this also applies to future leaders in Catholic education then we have a major challenge on our hands. There are growing concerns about the extent to which the culture and ethos of Catholic schools can continue to support and nurture faith…
Dear Editor, Brendan Butler congratulates Sarah Mullaly on her appointment as the first female supreme head of the Anglican Communion and goes on to refer to “women (in the Catholic Church) excluded not only from being ordained and forbidden from reading the Gospel at Mass.” This he claims “is an injustice against Catholic women and…
There is a sense in which anyone of a certain age is a product of Catholic Ireland, including those who react against it, but some are more formed by it than others. You can just see the indelible impression Catholic Ireland has left on them, and one such person in my opinion, is our president-elect,…
On Monday afternoon, my phone buzzed in my pocket. It was a call from The Irish Catholic, wondering about this week’s article! Alas, I had forgotten. For six days, I had been part of a group of forty-six pilgrims from the Dioceses of Achonry and Elphin, visiting Rome to celebrate the Jubilee of Hope. On…
A line runs through my childhood, the time before I went to Canada, and the time after. Aged five, the Troubles put paid to my Irish upbringing; but, I well remember bobbing for apples in Belfast at Halloween. It was a simple enough game, hands behind your back, trying to bite a bouncing apple on…
Two major gatherings last week — the Pre-Synodal Assembly in Kilkenny and the Researchers in Catholic Education Conference at Marino Institute — offered snapshots of a Church in motion: hopeful, energetic, and sincere, yet still wrestling with its deeper anxieties. Both spoke of renewal. Both faced the same unspoken question: does the Irish Church have…
Who would have predicted, in 1534, when Henry VIII broke with Rome, that 491 years later, Henry’s successor, Charles III, would embrace, and pray with, the successor to Clement VII, Pope Leo XIV? What a historic moment this meeting has been, and what reflections it prompts about the course of history. Consider the long years,…
“Leaving the meeting I felt strangely flat and disappointed” I was privileged to be a participant at the recent (October 18th) pre-synodal National Assembly in Kilkenny. It was good to be there, as many people said in the course of the day. The meeting had been meticulously prepared and was smoothly run on the…
Mary Kenny
David Quinn
Martina Purdy