What is it like to grow up in the age of the internet, social media, and smartphones? Think of your children and grandchildren and how often they have their heads stuck in their devices. You might even do the same thing yourself. I know I do. Sometimes, I have to consciously put my phone out…
Folklore promises that those who perish on the hill at Saul, Co. Down, will skip purgatory and go straight to Heaven. After all, it was here that St Patrick himself ended his days on March 17, 461AD. But the legend was not what drew the parish priest there as he marked his 75th birthday. Rather,…
Bro. John Conway, a Jesuit, working in Zimbabwe in the fifties, conspired with the British colonial government to undermine the independence movement, claiming the natives needed the British in order to have their souls saved. Someone once told me that Michael Collins, upon initially hearing of Dev’s reaction to the Treaty, he actually agreed with…
Dear Editor, The Irish Catholic has noted the Government’s intention to pay tribute to Daniel O’Connell in 2029, an intention without reference to his achievement of Catholic Emancipation in 1829. It’s best to leave the State to do its own thing. It believes it can celebrate O’Connell as an accomplished human rights activist while it itself…
So, young people aged 16 and over, in Northern Ireland, will forthwith be entitled to vote, as Keir Starmer’s government lowers the voting age all over the United Kingdom. It’s quite probable that a similar change will be introduced in the Republic, where the voting age currently stands at 18. There’s been much discussion as…
And so the long-awaited dig at the site of the former Tuam Children’s Home, to use its proper name, has begun. It is estimated that the dig will take around two years. The purpose is to find how many bodies are buried there, to give them a more appropriate burial and where possible to match…
An obscure border village in South Armagh has just received some famous visitors: St Paul the Apostle, St Teresa of Avila and St Agnes, among others. Actually, it was their relics that visited Meigh, a little village which rests in the shadow of Slieve Gullion. It was here that Shalom World TV decided, apparently for…
I am a native Irish speaker from Gaoth Dobhair in County Donegal — Ireland’s largest Gaeltacht. Grew up there during the 1970s and 1980s, immersed in a way of life that is now all but gone: one rooted in self-sufficiency, communal spirit, and the daily use of the Irish language. At the time, most households…
Dear Editor, the recent Ukrainian ‘Operation Spider web’, which targeted airbases and military hardware across Russia in a simultaneous drone attack over several time zones deep behind enemy lines without loss of life, was a sharp contrast with how the rest of the war was being waged in the trench warfare in eastern Ukraine aka…
They say that paper never refuses ink. As I sit to put ink to this page, I am saddened by many of the events happening in the world today. We hear of atrocities in the name of war, of murders in our homes and on our streets and of the heartbreak endured by far too…
David Quinn
Martina Purdy
Mary Kenny