If these stones could speak: The history of Christianity in Britain and Ireland through twenty buildings by Peter Stanford (Hodder & Stoughton, £20.00/€24.00) I have long found the books of Peter Stanford – a former editor of the Catholic Herald – no matter what their topic (he writes mostly about religion, history and ethics) to be always entertaining…
Month: October 2021
The future of the Covid booster dose
Medical Matters This month figures show that the number of confirmed cases of Covid-19 in the Republic of Ireland has surpassed 400,000 since the pandemic began. The death toll due to the coronovirus now stands at more than 5,000 of which about 75% occurred in those aged over 75. In fact, half of all deaths…
US Supreme Court to hear challenges to Texas heartbeat law
The US Supreme Court agreed to consider two legal challenges to Texas’ pro-life heartbeat law, just weeks before it hears oral arguments in another major abortion case. Both the Biden administration and abortion providers had opposed the Texas Heartbeat Act, a law which went into effect September 1 and which restricts most abortions after detection…
Vatican at COP26: Hearts and habits must change fast to care for creation
Even though Pope Francis will not attend the 26th UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow in person, the Vatican delegation and the Catholic Church will be “everywhere” during the two-week summit – from the highest-level private negotiations to the sidelines with grassroots “social action” and community-led events, said two delegates. And most importantly, Church representatives…
For the sake of the earth which God has given us…
Faith communities have a vital role to play in addressing the root causes of the environmental crisis and we must raise our voices, writes Jane Mellett During the Season of Creation this year the leaders of the Catholic Church, the Orthodox Church and the Anglican Communion issued a joint statement warning of the urgency of…
Celebrating and preserving the right to speak freely
PEN International: An Illustrated History edited by Charles Toner and others (Thames & Hudson, £45.00/€54.00) PEN International celebrated its centenary in London on October 5, 2021. As part of the celebrations the President, Jennifer Clement, and others published this absorbing history of PEN and its activities over those ten decades, edited by Charles Toner. Founded in…
Vatican Roundup
Pope Francis appeals that migrants not be sent back to unsafe countries Pope Francis made an appeal for migrants on Sunday, urging the international community to stop deporting migrants to unsafe countries. Speaking from the window of the Apostolic Palace, the Pope asked the Catholic pilgrims gathered in St Peter’s Square to pray in silence…
Beware of your inner circles
“No man is an island.” John Donne wrote those words four centuries ago and they are as true now as they were then, except we don’t believe them anymore. Today more and more of us are beginning to define our nuclear families and our carefully chosen circle of friends precisely as a self-sufficient island, and…
Ireland is wonderful to its missionaries
Sr Anne Cahill OLA tells Ruadhán Jones about her 50 years as a missionary Sr Anne Cahill OLA spent more than 50 years on mission to Nigeria, Sudan and Tanzania. In all that time, though the demographics of her order have changed, the generosity of the Irish people never has, she says. “We’ve done very…
Be Good Samaritans and answer call of ‘hurting world’
Living Laudato Si’ Earlier this month, the Archbishop of Dublin’s first pastoral letter, ‘The Cry of the Earth and the Cry of the Poor’, was launched in An Tairseach Ecology Centre, Wicklow. During his address, Archbishop Dermot Farrell noted, “the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor go hand in hand. There…