January begins with new promises and resolutions for the year. One of the most popular new year’s resolutions is to eat more healthily, especially if you enjoyed lots of selection boxes and chocolate coins over the festive season. It can be hard to break out of a habit of eating sweets and chocolate but you…
Baking with ground nuts is so much fun compared to using flour. But there is a little flour included in this recipe to help the cake rise. This cake is also delicious made with hazelnuts and orange zest instead of the pistachios and lemon. You can make the cakes without the icing too if you…
As you look forward to the year ahead, I am sure that like many others you have made resolutions and hope to keep to at least some of them. Parents have a the most responsible job in the world because your every action, gesture and word impacts on your children. When you stop to think…
Three feast days are approaching next week – all within just a few days of one another! The feast day you are probably most familiar is the feast of St Brigid on February 1. So you will no doubt be gathering bunches of rushes this weekend to make St Brigid’s cross. Traditionally, her crosses are…
Ireland never lets go of an Irish heart. The further we go from our homeland, the stronger it calls us home. French Canadians were never known for singing maudlin ballads lamenting the day they left Paris. English immigrants to Australia were not known to weep out of a heartfelt yearning for Suffolk. Yet we Irish…
Darragh McGann Darragh McGann describes how a year of loss and illness brought him back to God With the exception of two years, I have lived all of my life at home with my mother. My dad died before I reached the age of six and having been adopted as a baby, I didn’t have…
There are times in the Sunday liturgy when the priest has the option to read a shorter version of the Gospel. This Sunday is one of those times but I find myself hoping that priests around the country will opt for the longer version. Why? This Sunday we find ourselves in the early chapters of…
Annmarie O’Connor Taking a retreat from the internet can play a big role in reaching a happy medium in life, writes Annmarie O’Connor Mindless entertainment is a guilty pleasure – but when it creates a mental muffin top, then it’s time to cut back on the cognitive calories. A low-tech fast may appear gimmicky until…
With the Christmas decorations long gone and packed away until next December, the home can feel a little bare without some festive spark. And it’s a long wait before you can start making Easter decorations. January can be a miserably long month, especially when Spring is yet to arrive. But you can welcome Spring into…
Wendy Grace gives some pointers on how to ward off seasonal sorrows Often, at this time of year, even though we may have just spent our days counting our blessings with family and friends we can find ourselves feeling down with the ‘January blues’. Sometimes it can be referred to as SAD – Seasonal Affective…
Erin Fox
Bairbre Cahill
Wendy Grace