Category: Books

Christmas old, new… and abused

Christmas in the Cross Hairs: Two Thousand Years of Denouncing and Defending the World’s Most Celebrated Holiday by Chris Bowler (Oxford University Press, £20.00) In this first week of the New Year it may seem a little late to be reviewing a book about the history of the holiday that we have just got safely…

The progress of a man who wanted change

J. Anthony Gaughan Walter Carpenter: A Revolutionary Life by Ellen Galvin RSC (East Wall History Group, €5, or a donation to Cycle for Suicide charity; contact East Wall History Group at eastwallhistory@gmail.com) This little biography of Walter Carpenter is an authentic expression of Pietas. Written by a granddaughter, a retired nun based in Dublin, it…

Where I Find God: Personal Reflections from some of Ireland’s Finest Thinkers edited by Cora Guinnane & Joanne O’Brien, with a foreword by Mary McAleese  (Columba Press, €24.99) Some 53 contributors, drawn from many fields of life share in a few brief but intense paragraphs their experiences of the mystical as they personally encounter it.…