Ireland’s Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Leo Varadkar says religion should not be at the centre of society. Speaking on the weekend as Pope Francis made his first visit to Ireland, Varadkar noted since the last papal visit in 1979, Ireland has become more diverse. It is less religious and has modernised its laws on divorce, contraception, Read more
Irish victims of clergy abuse met with Pope Francis over the weekend during his visit to Ireland for the World Meeting of Families. His meetings met with a mixed response, with disappointment expressed by some of victims while others left heartened that he would respond to their plight. Read more
In the past four decades Ireland has become a different country, but you wouldn’t know it in Knock. In the small west of Ireland town that is home to the huge Marian shrine complex, it was hard to find a space on the tightly packed pews at 11am mass last week. The rows of the Read more
Church bells rang simultaneously and prayers were offered across Ireland’s 26 dioceses to launch the five-day World Meeting of Families Catholic congress. Read more
Early in the morning of Aug. 9, Argentina’s Senate soundly defeated a measure to legalize abortion through 14 weeks of pregnancy. (Their current law permits abortion in cases of sexual violence and to protect the mother’s health.) The intense debate—both in the culture at large and in the Senate chamber—often invoked a similar process that Read more
A former Irish foreign minister says a Vatican representative asked him for help to protect the Vatican from possible claims that might be made against the Church in the future. Dermot Ahern says a senior Vatican official sought him out to make an agreement in 2004. In the agreement, Ireland would indemnify the Catholic Church Read more
The most famous singing priest of Ireland discerned his call after St. John Paul II’s visit to the country in 1979. He hopes that Pope Francis’s trip in August will also spark new vocations. “I suppose people are a bit down over the Church. Certainly, vocations are down,” says Father Ray Kelly, the 65 year-old Read more
Priests are not the best people to train others for marriage, according to the head of the Vatican’s office for the family. “They have no credibility; they have never lived the experience; they may know moral theology, dogmatic theology in theory, but to go from there to putting it into practice every day … they Read more
The Pope’s views on homosexuality and women should change, says former Irish President Mary McAleese. Focusing on homosexuality, she says she cannot go to the World Meeting of Families when the Pope visits Ireland in August, as it does not include LGBTI people. In her view, the Church’s “evil” teaching on homosexuality gave rise to Read more
A ‘Say Nope to the Pope’ Facebook page is encouraging people to protest against Pope Francis’s visit to Ireland in August. The campaign aims to ensure a low turnout at planned events at the triennial World Meeting of Families. So far over 1,000 people have clicked “attending” the protest and another 4,000 say they are Read more