A Little Book of Encouragement edited by Vinita Hampton Wright, adapted from Sacred Space the Prayer Book (Messenger Publications, €9.95) The items in this book have been adapted from the prayer site, but this book is small enough to fit in a briefcase, pocket or handbag. Here are warm words of encouragement that will lift the…
Migration and the Making of Ireland by Bryan Fanning (UCD Press, €25) Joe Carroll This is “the first comprehensive history of migration to and from the island of Ireland”, according to the publisher’s blurb. It certainly is comprehensive as it goes back to Neolithic times and up to more recent arrivals of Nigerians, Poles, Romanians and…
Memoir: Remembering Krzysztof Joseph Romanowski by J. Anthony Gaughan (Kingdom Books, €15.00; available from Veritas branches) Today Polish is now the second most spoken language in Ireland (as Joe Carroll observes elsewhere on this page). Fr Gaughan’s new little book goes some way to explaining why this is. It consists of a brief, but moving memoir,…
With the referendum on the Eighth Amendment fast approaching it’s hard to keep up with all the media coverage, but a few items stand out. Instead of doing a head-to-head debate which might have allowed for claims to be interrogated, News at One (RTÉ Radio 1) had two obstetricians on different days. As journalists just…
Generous Love in Multi-Faith Ireland: Towards Mature Citizenship and a Positive Pedagogy for the Church of Ireland in Local Christian–Muslim Mission and Engagement by Suzanne Cousins (Church of Ireland Publishing, €6.00 / £5.00; available from the Theological Institute, Braemor Park, Dublin 14. ) The Rev. Suzanne Cousins was ordained to the Church of Ireland ministry in…
There’s a passage in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass where Alice meets Humpty Dumpty, perched on his wall, and is startled to find him using the word ‘glory’ to mean, in effect, ‘q.e.d.’, and says so. “When I use a word,” the scornful egg replies, “it means just what I choose it to mean…
Citizen Lane (G) Such was the esteem in which art dealer Hugh Lane was held, if he even looked at a painting in a gallery, its value escalated. He lived in a period of literary rather than artistic ferment in Ireland. There were more people like W.B. Yeats than his brother Jack. “I’m going to revive…
Journeying in Faith: A Walk with Christ by Cecil Hyland (Church of Ireland Publishing, €12.50) This book is something of a profession of Christian faith, in all its aspects, which Canon Cecil Hyland distils the experience he garnered from a variety of ministries in the Church of Ireland. Like John Bunyan’s Pilgrim he has “earned the…
Our Father: Reflections on the Lord’s Prayer by Pope Francis (Rider, £9.99) This little book, which is issued to mark the fifth anniversary of the Pope’s election, is like so many of the publications which bear his name, drawn from an interview, or rather conversation, with a friendly interlocutor. This was Fr Marco Pozza, a priest…
Spuds and the Spider by Séamus Ó Conaill (Gill Books, €8.99) The President’s Glasses by Peter Donnelly (Gill Books, €9.99) Margaret Gleason Spuds Potsofgold lives an idyllic life with his wife Rose Goodytwoshoes in the cosy surroundings of Toadstool Cottage, except for one nuisance – an eight-legged, hairy and googly-eyed spider called Leggers McWeb, who is in…
Peter Costello
Brendan O’Regan
Greg Daly
Aubrey Malone