Pope Francis was famous for his love of the Tango – and indeed hundreds of couples performed this Latin dance in St Peter’s Square to mark his 78th birthday in 2014. But Francis later confessed he had a preference for the Milonga – a faster, more intense version of this amazing dance, which is perhaps…
Throughout the Troubles, when buses were being burned or hijacked in Belfast, the Black taxi became a popular way of getting in and out of town. Men, women and children from the west of the city, often five or six at a time, would pile into the back seats, prams in the boot, and fly…
A quiet country retreat in County Down last week began rather unexpectedly when my friend and I spotted a sheep caught in some wire at the edge of a field. A couple of city slickers, we were a bit hesitant. But my friend was concerned enough to knock on a local door that Saturday evening.…
The sticker plastered on a Belfast lamp post made me smile. “I’ve read the last chapter – God wins!” A source of hope in a world of death, destruction and doom. How easy it is for us to forget that the battle for salvation, for our lives, has already been won. Despite death and darkness…
It was the summer of 2014 when I first heard the harmony. It was so flawless, I thought it must have been a recording. In fact it was the sweet sound of seminarians from St Bonaventure’s, a Francisan college, in Lusaka, Zambia, located next to the orphanage, where I was volunteering. At the time, St…
A new Irishman named Patrick from Nigeria was among a group of pilgrims who prayed at St Patrick’s grave in Downpatrick, Co. Down, to mark his annual feast day. Patrick Ahaotu said St Patrick is patron of Nigeria and he has always celebrated March 17 as he was taught by Irish priests and the feast…
The American ice-cream company Ben and Jerry’s has a beautiful motto: peace, love and ice-cream. But frankly, it has an ugly agenda when it comes to babies in the womb. And no matter how much sugar they pour into their ice-cream, it will never sweeten the bitter taste of abortion. And as we approach the…
It was on the way to Mass that I first heard the story of St Joseph and Bobby Clarke. My friend’s aunt, Ann Kelly, needed a lift, and the pair of them were catching up, as I listened from the back seat. “As you know,” said Ann, “I fell out with St Joseph for 33…
Five words, delivered during a homily on Ash Wednesday, have never entirely left me: “You all have to change,” the priest declared rather prophetically on March 6, 2019. He did not know that four women in our Falls Road congregation had been told the previous night that their vocation as Sisters of Adoration was over.…
Easter might be late this year, but Lent has come early for a group of Irish men, who have signed up for ‘spiritual bootcamp’. While the Lenten journey is 40 days, an estimated 1,000 Irish men are about halfway through a 90 day experience – which includes daily cold showers and no television. “It’s Lent…