Patricia Casey The sexual abuse of children by priests has been a huge stain on the life of the Catholic Church, particularly in Ireland, the United States and parts of Europe. It has damaged the wellbeing of its victims, leading some to take their own lives. It has ruined the reputation of Catholicism in…
Mike Lewis Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández has a tough job. Ever since he took over as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) in mid-September, the Argentine theologian has been working hard to be the doctrine chief that Pope Francis asked him to be. When Fernández was appointed in July,…
Letter From Rome H.L. Mencken once famously quipped that love is like war, in that it’s easy to begin but very hard to stop. Had Mencken plied his journalistic trade in the internet age, he might well have added rumours to that list, which are notoriously easy these days to put into circulation and virtually…
John Henry Newman: A Portrait in Letters edited by Roderick Strange (Oxford University Press, £30.00) Over the centuries biography has changed. When James Boswell published in 1791 his landmark life of Dr Samuel Johnson, he revealed that he had adapted the new method of Rev. William Mason in his life of Gray, in allowing the…
John L. Allen Jr.
Peter Costello