Wishing you every blessing this Christmas

Pope Francis has issued new norms for the universal church outlining how allegations of abuse have to be dealt with.
It has received extensive coverage in Vatican News.

Michael Sean Winters also writes in the National Catholic Reporter of the latest directive of Pope Francis that “establishes new laws for the universal church regarding both the scourge of abuse and the equally abhorrent covering up of such abuse.”
“If you are ordained, or belong to a religious order, you are now a mandatory reporter of abuse. You can’t ignore it.”

Article by Gerry O’Hanlon in the current issue of The Furrow. Link to The Furrow: https://thefurrow.ie/category/current-issue/ Last November (2022), in a wide-ranging interview with the Jesuit magazine America, Pope Francis…

Brendan Hoban, writing in the Western People, again comments on the decreasing numbers of priests to serve in Ireland and the consequences that arise as a result for the remaining, mainly elderly, priests.
But he adds “my interest here is not in the priesthood issue.
Rather it’s on how the failure to address this issue by the leadership of our Church is impinging on the immediate victims (the present priests) caught in the slipstream of an on-going decision by the Irish bishops to continue to avoid ‘the elephant in the living room’.
“Are there not a few bishops who might do a Bishop Kräutler on it and have a chat with Pope Francis about the implications of his Christmas message – ‘the world has changed and so must the Church’?
What is it about that sentence that the Irish bishops don’t understand or refuse to accept, even though almost every Catholic in Ireland seems happy to acknowledge?”

SOME TRADITIONS OF CHRISTMAS Christmas is Christmas because of one event – the Birth of Christ. There is a comprehensive list of Advent and Christmas customs in a booklet by…

Following meetings of the Advisory Committee, ACP Leadership Team and a discussion at the recent ACP AGM, it has been agreed to increase annual membership of the ACP to €50….

More Rumours of Angels The delights of a frosty morning: These mornings seem eerie. The Tolka River holds its breath. I am suspicious of the quietness. The heron appears sometimes….