Attempting to follow in Our Lady’s footsteps, Sarah Deegan places the utmost emphasis on our common foundation as children of God, whether it’s in her work as a secondary school teacher or in her work with the Legion of Mary. Her faith is wrapped up in the Legion, with her parents being strong proponents of…
Twenty Catholic missionaries were killed across the world in 2020, the information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies has said. Agenzia Fides reported December 30 that those who lost their lives in service of the Church comprised eight priests, three religious women, one male religious, two seminarians, and six lay people. Previous years As in previous…
Currently, we are not allowed to go to Mass again in the Republic. All public worship is effectively banned. From the end of March last year until the end of June, public worship was called off, and again in places like Donegal and Dublin from September until early December, and in the rest of the…
The Christmas to New Year season is a rich time for TV and Radio programmes with a religious flavour. Much of the material is made up of repeats so I’m always on the lookout for something different. The mockumentary Death to 2020 (Netflix) was ideal viewing for New Year’s Eve – a scattershot and satirical…
While Irish cuisine can seem simple or plain, it is nothing if not hearty. Colcannon, Irish stew, chowder and potatoes of all kinds – they’re hearty, filling and rely on a limited selection of ingredients. I read recently the account a nun gave of her childhood in the West of Ireland in the early 1900s.…
Fr Reginald Foster, a friar of the Discalced Carmelite Order, passed away on Christmas day at the age of 81. Originally from Milwaukee in the US state of Wisconsin, Fr Reginald spent almost 40 years as one of the Vatican’s foremost experts in the Latin language. He worked in the Latin Letters section of the…
The White House issued a proclamation honouring the 850th anniversary of the martyrdom of St Thomas Becket and inviting “the people of the United States to observe the day in schools and churches and customary places of meeting with appropriate ceremonies.” The proclamation, signed by President Donald Trump December 28, described Becket as “a statesman,…
We went walking in Glenveagh yesterday. It is a walk we have done many times but this time we took a notion and walked it backwards, beginning at the end and ending up at the beginning. What has always been a nice walk was transformed. Coming from a height, down now towards the lake, with…
Fifty years ago, in 1971, a very fine Dominican priest (and philosopher), Fergal O’Connor, set up an organisation to support unmarried mothers, calling it ‘Ally’. In her autobiography, Political Woman the late Nuala Fennell, T.D. – the first minister for women’s rights – praised Fr O’Connor most especially for his pioneering and compassionate work in…
Carol Glatz Even though the baptisms the Pope celebrates most years in the Sistine Chapel are better known, the most important place to be baptised in Rome for the past nearly 1,600 years has been the baptistery of St John Lateran. Baptistery The ancient baptistery was built in 440 AD just behind the Basilica…
David Quinn
Brendan O’Regan
Ruadhán Jones
Bairbre Cahill
Mary Kenny