‘So are they all, all honourable men’ The controversy that has been aroused by Bob Geldof (or should that be Sir Bob?) handing back his deed as Honorary Freeman of the City of Dublin at the City Hall has focused public attention on just what this title is. Turning as I always do to…
If I settle down to Sunday night TV I want something cosy, undemanding, even uplifting, but that’s not how it turned out last weekend. Would You Believe? (RTÉ 1) returned with impact last Sunday night with the first episode in a two-part exploration of the subject of evil. Mick Peelo’s report didn’t contain any blinding…
Breaking News: An Autobiography by Jeremy Thompson (Biteback Publishing, £20.00) Peter Hegarty Thompson’s writing is as assured and informed as his reports for Sky News were. He has a keen eye for the haunting details of a story, describing the scorched shapes of Iraqi soldiers, ‘sightlessly staring’ from the cabs of their burned-out trucks. During a…
I am infinitely loved: A month of meditations by Brian Grogan S.J. (Messenger Publications, €4.95) The title of this little pamphlet is taken from a remark by Pope Francis: “When all is said and done, we are infinitely loved.” Brian Grogan reapplies this to draw out in a month’s course of meditations the idea that each…
Suburbicon (15A) George Clooney working with the Coen Brothers? Surely not. Would that not be a bit like Cary Grant teaming up with David Lynch? And yet here he is, doing it for a fifth time and carrying it again, calibrating the twisted parabolas of this jocosely dark parable with a deftness one mightn’t have…
Laudato Si’: An Irish response, essays on the Pope’s Letter on the Environment edited by Sean McDonagh (Veritas, €14.99) Eamon Ryan The papal encyclical Laudato Si’ has been described as ‘a most dangerous book’. It attempts a giant leap forward in the church’s social teaching by calling for a profound ecological conversion, which brings…
Murtaí Óg: Murtaí Óg Ó Súilleabháin (c. 1710-54): a life contextualised by Gerard J. Lyne, (Geography Publications, €25.00) Here once again this author writes with authority about his local area. His The Lansdowne Estate in Kerry under the agency of William Steuart Trench, 1849-72 was a classic account of an Irish landlord’s agent in the…
I’ve long admired the media work of Michael Buerk, and his show The Moral Maze last Saturday on BBC Radio 4 was a most thorough, insightful, and civilised discussion – people were listening to each other! The topic was ‘moral progress’, especially in the light of current Westminster controversies. The format was unusual enough –…
At times one wonders about the loudest voices on the Catholic internet – the old adage about empty cans making the most noise can seem alarmingly apt. Andrea Tornielli surely has a point on lastampa.it when he observes: “Too many are causing unceasing confusion in their self-referential media circles and then say that today in…
Pat O’Kelly History will be made this weekend with Handel’s Messiah heard for the first time in the Basilica at Knock on Saturday evening. Under Proinnsías Ó Duinn, the occasion commemorates the 275th anniversary of the oratorio’s première in Neal’s Musick Hall in Dublin’s Fishamble Street. The current event unites Our Lady’s Choral Society,…
Peter Costello
Brendan O’Regan
Aubrey Malone
Greg Daly