“There has never been a greater need for mutual understanding and cooperation”, writes Michael Kelly Sadly we’re becoming all-too-used to that sinking feeling of waking up in the morning to turn on the radio to news of yet another terrorist atrocity in towns and cities that are known to us. That feeling is all-the-more heart-wrenching…

“With abortion legislation, he did not permit deputies to vote according to their consciences”, writes Mary Kenny Europe is this year marking the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther’s famous first protest, in 1517, which became in effect, the beginning of what is sometimes called the Protestant Revolution, and sometimes the Reformation. The Catholic Church has,…

We are challenged to build an economy that is designed to serve people, says President Michael D. Higgins At the Vatican, I had the great honour of meeting with a man who exemplifies in the most striking and moving of manners the extraordinary importance of the spiritual as a powerful wellspring of global ethics, coupled…

It is easier for politicians to attack the Church and go along with the secular agenda, writes David Quinn What are Catholics to make of Enda Kenny’s time as Taoiseach? This is a very broad question because the answer doesn’t depend solely on his attitude towards the ‘institutional Church’ or to some of the big…

When Friedrich Nietzsche declared that “God is dead” he added a question: What kind of a sponge does it take to wipe away a whole horizon? I often ask that question because just in my own lifetime there has been an unprecedented decline in the number of people who go to church regularly and, more…

Fr Vincent Sherlock Two days before the celebration of Confirmation in our parish we gathered for a short practice. I looked at the group of 38 boys and girls preparing for Confirmation (as an aside, the 38, typical, I would say, of many parishes like my own, represent the total number of pupils in senior…

Finola Kennedy The Jesuit Pope might visit the shrine of a colleague, but there’s another nearby tomb he could consider as well, writes Finola Kennedy When stepping down from the role of Taoiseach, both Charlie Haughey and Brian Cowen quoted household names: William Shakespeare and John F. Kennedy respectively. Not so Bertie Ahern who quoted…

My first love was literature, novels and poetry. As a child, I loved story books, mysteries and adventures. In grade school, I was made to memorise poetry and loved the exercise. High school introduced me to more serious literature, Shakespeare, Kipling, Keats, Wordsworth, Browning. On the side, I still read story books, cowboy tales from…