The Life and Times of Daniel Murray: Archbishop of Dublin 1823 – 1852 by Thomas J. Morrissey SJ (Messenger Publications, €27.00) Tom Morrissey’s latest book is one which everyone interested in Irish Church history has long looked for. It was as a pastoral bishop that the great Daniel Murray excelled. It is no exaggeration to claim…
Forged In Crisis: The Power of Courageous Leadership in Turbulent Times by Nancy Koehn (John Murray, £14.99) Joe Carroll The five ‘leaders’ discussed in this book are an unusual mix: the Antarctic explorer, Ernest Shackleton; US President Abraham Lincoln; anti-slavery campaigner and ex-slave, Frederick Douglass; German theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer; and finally Rachael Carson, author of The Silent…
Philosophy of Religion: A Very Short Introduction by Tim Bayne (Oxford University Press, £7.99) Emily Keyes Christian theological scholar Don Cupitt says that philosophy is, at its heart, critical thinking, while academic philosopher Simon Blackburn thinks of philosophy as ‘a process of reflection on the deepest concepts, that is structures of thought, that make up…
Dirty Glory: Go Where Your Best Prayers Take You by Pete Greig (Hodder & Stoughton, £9.99) Emily Keyes In a world that seems increasingly ambivalent to religion and God, Pete Greig’s ‘24-7 prayer revolution’ is nothing short of incredible. Started in 1999, the prayer movement began as a humble gathering of young people curious to learn…
Pat O’Kelly Despite visiting Leipzig last year during its annual Bach Festival, my musical encounters centred not on Johann Sebastian but on Claudio Monteverdi, as the event also celebrated the Italian master’s 450th anniversary through his proto-opera Orfeo and magnificent Vespers of the Blessed Virgin. The St Nicholas Lutheran Church provided the resplendent ecumenical…
Ironically, after celebrating St Patrick abroad and at home, Government figures lost no time in getting down to making it easier to end the lives of unborn children. The issue figured intensively in the media most of the week and I wasn’t too pleased with RTÉ’s idea of balanced coverage. It felt at times too…
Fáilte Pope Francis … from the Children of Ireland (Columba Press, €14.99) This delightful book had its origins in a competition run by The Irish Catholic with primary schools all over Ireland encouraging young children to write a letter of welcome to the Pope on his visit in August this year to Dublin for the…
In the years immediately after the ending of the Great War, or the “War to save civilisation” as WWI was once called, Europe and then the wider world became aware of the existence in a remote village in Southern Italy of a priest for whom the most extraordinary claims, not just of piety, but of…
St Patrick’s weekend brought a flurry of snow and religious programmes of varying quality, some related to the feast day, some not. On the Friday, BBC2 launched a new series, Pilgrimage – The Road to Santiago, featuring a bunch of celebrities doing sections of the Camino pilgrimage over a few weeks. It was enjoyable, took…
Mary Magdalene (12A) Whatever we may say about the Biblical epics of yore, they exuded power. Even the run-of-the-mill (or should I say De Mille) ones. The problem with Garth Davis’ Mary Magdalene is that it tries so hard to be ‘authentic’ it sacrifices the iconic benchmarks of scripture to subdued sidebars. It’s a plodding film…
Brendan O’Regan
Peter Costello
Aubrey Malone