Official Sunday of the Word icon unveiled at Vatican An icon of the encounter with Jesus on the road to Emmaus was chosen as the official logo for the worldwide celebration of the Sunday of the Word of God. The colourful logo is based on an icon written by the late-Benedictine Sr Marie-Paul Farran, a…
From the Underground Church to Freedom by Tomáš Halík (Notre Dame Press, $US35.00 / £39.50) Frank Litton The 1950s were grim in Czechoslovakia. The promise of liberation had not delivered. The state acquiesced in a foreign-based orthodoxy which it imposed with brutality. Censorship stifled thought. It was into this Communist dominated world that…
The Diary of Elizabeth Dillon: A Gateway to the Otherness of the Past edited with an introduction by Brendan O’Cathaoir (Currach Books, €34.99) Frank Callanan This delightful book is considerable editorial feat. The diaries of Elizabeth Dillon are copious running to 38 journals, and have been rendered down by the editor without any…
Dear Editor, It was refreshing to read your comment piece (IC 16/1/20) about the need to set aside old-fashioned political loyalties in the context of next month’s general election. Far too many people with deeply-held religious beliefs are willing to leave them at the door when they go to the polling booth. Both the main…
Notebook A question that arises for priests (outside of cities) concerns Sunday funerals. In particular, priests wonder if it is fair to transform a scheduled Sunday Mass into what becomes in effect a funeral Mass, with burial afterwards, often in the adjoining churchyard or a nearby cemetery. Ireland may well be the only country in…
‘Is the air in your home affecting your health?,’ asks Róise McGagh ‘Go out and get a bit of fresh air’, we were told, by parents, teachers and friends. Whether we are feeling under the weather mentally or physically. But what is so bad about the indoors? It is a recent enough biome in terms…
Starting on a high note Marking their silver jubilee, the 25th Festival of Youth Orchestras will see young musicians from across Ireland gather in the National Concert Hall next month. Presented by the Irish Association of Youth Orchestras, the festival is the annual celebration of youth orchestras in Ireland, and their members, with a diverse…
I was walking through the carpark into the supermarket when she waved at me and said hello. Well actually it was more like “ello” which is fair enough as she was only about 18 months old, sitting in the trolley while her mum packed bags of groceries into the boot of the car. “Ello” she called…
Establishing romantic relationships can be difficult for young Catholics in the 21st Century, writes Amy Hurle McCann In his book Love and Responsibility, St Pope John Paul II writes of the challenges, cautioning against using people as a “means to an end”. He emphasises that each person should be treated as “an object of…
Just Mercy (12A) In 1987, an innocent African American man called Walter McMillan (Jamie Foxx) was sentenced to death for the murder of an 18-year-old girl in Alabama. He was convicted on nothing more than the false evidence of criminal Ralph Myers (Tim Blake Nelson) who was offered a commutation of his sentence for furnishing…
Bairbre Cahill
Aubrey Malone