Inés San Martín For a man who lashes out against misinformation, defamation, calumny and spreading scandal, even once comparing the last offense to eating faeces, Pope Francis has been a victim of several fake news cycles of his own, with one claiming he wanted to change the Ten Commandments being the latest to go viral.…
“The most fitting tribute to Martin’s legacy would be to again find that courage to cut a deal”, writes Michael Kelly The former deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness was a complex man who embarked on a complex journey. From a childhood where he witnessed first-hand the discrimination suffered by Catholics in the North to a…
Martin McGuinness turned away from the path of violence towards the path of peace and reconciliation”, writes Mary Kenny There is little doubt that opinions about Martin McGuinness remained divided at the time of his death. Norman Tebbit, the Conservative peer, could neither forget nor forgive the Brighton bomb of 1984, which crippled his wife…
Bishop Eamonn Casey “…was greatly loved by the priests and people of the dioceses of both Kerry and Galway”, writes Michael Kelly It’s hard to get across to younger generations today the enormity of the scandal that was the revelation in 1992 that Bishop Eamonn Casey had secretly fathered a child years earlier. One got…
What would Ireland be without St Patrick? asks Mary Kenny What would Ireland be without St Patrick? Before Christianity, the classical world knew almost nothing of Hibernia. According to Philip Freeman, visiting divinity scholar at Harvard, “the few references to Ireland in classical sources are largely complaints that the island was a land of savages…
Many Irish Christians will have felt sadness and sympathy when Cardinal Desmond Connell died last month. While secure in his convictions, he was faced as Archbishop of Dublin with mounting difficulties, to which past practices provided few answers. He bore his office with courtesy and dignity, and tried to carry out his responsibilities to the…
The good the orders did must be offset against the harm, writes David Quinn The legacy of Ireland’s institutions continues to haunt us, whether they be industrial schools, mother and baby homes, or Magdalene homes. Can the mental hospitals be far behind? Women considered ‘fallen’ ended up in institutions, so did their babies. Children guilty…
Dear Editor, In this era where rights overshadow responsibilities and when personal preferences shout louder than Christian doctrine, it may seem churlish to point out that sacred music offered at Mass and especially during Communion should be (a) sacred and (b) appropriate. Indeed, at the beginning of March, Pope Francis, speaking at a gathering organised…
Everything is gift. That’s a principle that ultimately undergirds all spirituality, all morality, and every commandment. Everything is gift. Nothing can be ultimately claimed as our own. Genuine moral and religious sensitivity should make us aware of that. Nothing comes to us by right. This isn’t something we automatically know. During a class some years…
Fr Conor McDonough OP As part of their 2017 celebrations, Dublin’s St Patrick’s Day Festival commissioned a poem, ‘My Ireland’, by Stephen James Smith, available now on YouTube. It’s a kaleidoscope of incongruous impressions of contemporary Ireland and its various mythologies, with some very moving parts and powerfully complemented by the accompanying music and images.…
Michael Kelly
Mary Kenny
Dr Martin Mansergh
David Quinn
Fr Ronald Rolheiser