‘The times they are a changin’’: Tracing the transformation of Irish Catholicism through the eyes of a journalist

Author(s):  
Patsy McGarry

Patsy McGarry draws on the knowledge of the changed role of religion in Irish society that he has accumulated as religious affairs correspondent of The Irish Times through the troubled recent decades. He points out that until the Church hierarchy is prepared to acknowledge responsibility for their poor handling of the clerical abuse scandals and the pain inflicted on the survivors, there will be no healing. His treatment of the various scandals and the role of Irish bishops in trying to limit reputational damage to the Church, illustrate McGarry’s contention that the times are definitely ‘a changin’’ and they will continue to do so for some time to come in Ireland.

Horizons ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 292-305
Author(s):  
Lieven Boeve

ABSTRACTThe Church has the duty in every age of examining the signs of the times and interpreting them in the light of the gospel, so that it can offer in a manner appropriate to each generation replies to the continual human questionings on the meaning of this life and the life to come and on how they are related. There is a need, then, to be aware of, and to understand, the world in which we live, together with its expectations, its desires and its frequently dramatic character (Gaudium et spes 4).


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Deepika Swain ◽  
Lalatendu Kesari Jena ◽  
Sanket Sunand Dash ◽  
Rama Shankar Yadav

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to empirically exhibit the moderating effect of learner interaction (LI) on motivation to learn (MTL), mobile learning (ML) and online learning climate (OLC), so as to bring in enhanced rigour to the virtual knowledge dissemination during the times of crisis. Design/methodology/approach A total of 784 valid responses were considered for the confirmatory factor analysis to test the proposed hypotheses. Findings The study found that MTL and ML contributed to improved OLC and high LI moderated the positive relationship between MTL, ML and OLC. LI also directly contributed to an improved OLC. Practical implications Measures need to be designed to crowbar motivation to ensure heightened interaction of learners, to gear up the ML reach soaring heights achieving a dynamic OLC. Acclimatization of the OLC will be the visionary solution to tackle learning disruption during today’s pandemic times and also many other challenges to come in near-far future. Originality/value The current study established the moderating role of LI in influencing OLC, and also motivating facilitator’s for designing upgraded content, and thereby fuelling the intention to learn.


Vox Patrum ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 52 (1) ◽  
pp. 291-315
Author(s):  
Jan Iluk

In 1CorHom, edited in the autumn and winter of 392 and 393 AD, John Chrysostom found a natural opportunity to return to his numerous utterances on the role of love in the lives of people. Obviously, the opportunity was the 13“ chapter of this Letter - The Song of Love. Among his works, we will find a few more smali works which were created with the intention of outlining the Christian ideał of love. Many of the contemporary monographs which were devoted to the ancient understanding of Christian „love” have the phrase „Eros and Agape” in their titles. In contemporary languages, this arrangement extends between sex and love. Both in the times of the Church Fathers (the 4th century AD) and currently, the distance between sex and love is measured by feelings, States and actions which are morę or less refined and noble. The awareness of the existence of many stops over this distance leads to the conviction that our lives are a search for the road to Agape. As many people are looking not so much for a shortcut but for a shorter route, John Chrysostom, like other Church Fathers, declared: the shortest route, because it is the most appropriate for this aim, is to live according to the Christian virtues that have been accumulated by the Christian politeia. There are to be found the fewest torments and disenchantments, although there are sacrifices. Evangelical politeia, the chosen and those who have been brought there will find love) - as a State of existence. In the earthly dimension, however, love appears as a causative force only in the circle of the Christian politeia. Obviously, just as in the heavenly politeia, the Christian politeia on earth is an open circle for everyone. As Chrysostom’s listeners and readers were not only Christians (in the multi-cultural East of the Roman Empire), and as the background of the principles presented in the homilies was the everyday life and customs of the Romans of the time, the ideał - dyam] - was placed by him in the context of diverse imperfections in the rangę and form of the feelings exhibited, which up to this day we still also cali love. It is true that love has morę than one name. By introducing the motif of love - into deliberations on the subject of the Christian politeia, John Chrysostom finds and indicates to the faithful the central force that shaped the ancient Church. This motif fills in the vision of the Heavenly Kingdom, explains to Christians the sense of life that is appropriate to them in the Roman community and explains the principles of organised life within the boundaries of the Church. It can come as no surprise that the result of such a narrative was Chrysostonfs conviction that love is „rationed”: Jews, pagans, Hellenes and heretics were deprived of it. In Chrysostonfs imagination, the Christian politeia has an earthly and a heavenly dimension. In the heavenly politeia, also called by him Chrisfs, the Lord’s or the


2021 ◽  
pp. 16-40
Author(s):  
Tom O’Donoghue ◽  
Judith Harford

In the latter half of the eighteenth and early decades of the nineteenth century the priests’ leadership role in Ireland increased, aided by the relaxation of the Penal Laws and the eventual granting of Catholic Emancipation throughout the United Kingdom in 1829. Concurrently, a new generation of reforming bishops shook off the approach of caution of their predecessors towards government and became increasingly assertive about Catholic interests, including in education. That assertiveness is central in the considerations of this chapter. Developments in relation to the role of the Catholic Church (the Church) in Irish society from the decades prior to the Great Famine of 1845–48 are outlined. Relations between the Church and the State on education from the establishment of the Irish National School System in 1831 to the advent of national independence in 1922 are then examined. In the third section the activity of ‘the triumphalist Church in Ireland’ for the period from 1922 to the introduction of ‘free second-level education’ in 1967 is detailed.


2019 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-95
Author(s):  
Matthew Kerry

The secularizing efforts of the Spanish Second Republic met fierce resistance from Catholics and the Church. Local authorities spearheaded secularization in an unclear legal context, yet they also attempted to mediate between different demands, while protecting Catholic sentiment and respecting property rights. Cemeteries and funeral processions were a key battleground in a ‘culture war’ which straddles the nineteenth-century preoccupation with the role of religion in the lives of Spanish citizens and the intensity of interwar conflict, the bitter struggles to occupy public space, and the mobilization of antagonistic conceptualizations of the ‘people’.


2015 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 260-294
Author(s):  
Wendy Kennett

AbstractThe recent decision of the United Kingdom Supreme Court in Regina (Hodkin and another) v Registrar General for Births, Deaths and Marriages concerned the registration of the premises belonging to the Church of Scientology in London as a place of worship, specifically for the purpose of enabling a marriage to take place there which would be valid in law. This article examines the continuing significance of a registered place of worship in the English law rules on formalities of marriage. It provides a brief history of the role of religion in the solemnization of marriages in England and Wales, and the emergence of the “place of worship” as a constituent element in the celebration of a valid marriage. The role of marriage at a registered place of worship in the current legislation governing the formalities of marriage is considered, along with the impact on that scheme of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013. The exceptional character of the approach adopted by English law is highlighted by a comparative survey of laws on the solemnization of marriages, which also demonstrates some of the problems arising out of alternative solutions. Finally, recent attempts to reform the law are noted, followed by some concluding remarks on possible future developments.


2020 ◽  
Vol 67 (4) ◽  
pp. 599-616
Author(s):  
Jordi Collet-Sabé

This article aims to consider the role of religion in the integration process of children born to immigrants in host societies (second generation) in Spain using the theory of segmented assimilation of Portes and Rumbaut and Portes, Aparicio and Haller. It is based on an exploratory qualitative research project conducted in a medium-sized city in Catalonia that examined the integration of young people of different origins and the role religion played in this process. To do so, we proffer a religious discrimination hypothesis: a scenario in which Islam, but not other religions, can become a significant barrier to positive assimilation. According to the results, this ‘religious stigma’ scenario occurs in the majority of the young Muslims who were interviewed and across many aspects of their lives.


Exchange ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 105-126
Author(s):  
Teddy Chalwe Sakupapa

Abstract This contribution explores the interaction between religion and politics in a religiously plural and ethnically multidimensional Zambian context. Given the political salience of both religion and ethnicity in Zambian politics, this research locates an understudied aspect in the discourse on religion and politics in Zambia, namely the multiple relations between religion, ethnicity and politics. It specifically offers a historical-theological analysis of the implications that the political mobilisation of religion has for ecumenism in Zambia since Edgar Chagwa Lungu became the country’s president (2015-2018). Underlining the church-dividing potential of non-theological (doctrinal) factors, the article argues that the ‘political mobilisation of religion’ and the ‘pentecostalisation of Christianity’ in Zambia are reshaping the country’s ecumenical landscapes. Accordingly, this contribution posits the significance of ecumenical consciousness among churches and argues for a contextual ecumenical ecclesiology.


1994 ◽  
Vol 45 (4) ◽  
pp. 661-672 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. H. C. Frend

Thus Gibbon opened the thirty-seventh chapter of the History of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, a lengthy chapter devoted to the twin topics of ‘the institution of monastic life’ and ‘the conversion of the northern barbarians’. The connection between the history of the Roman Empire and the Christian Church was indeed indissoluble. The Church was destined to follow the pattern of the empire by gradually degenerating as it grew in strength from original purity in the life of Christ and the Apostles to become a corrupt and baleful influence on the fortunes of secular society. Looking back over twenty years of research and writing (1767–87) he wrote near the beginning of his final chapter, ‘In the preceding volumes of this History, I have described the triumph of barbarism and religion and I can only resume in a few words, their real or imaginary connection with the ruin of ancient Rome.’ He goes on to list ‘potent and forcible causes of destruction’ by barbarians and Christians respectively. As he finally laid down his pen on 27 June 1787 at Lausanne, he concluded with a sentence whose strict accuracy has sometimes been doubted: ‘It was among the ruins of the Capitol that I first conceived the idea of a work which has amused and exercised twenty years of my life, and which, however inadequate to my wishes, I finally deliver to the curiosity and candour of the public.’ The date of this decision was 15 October 1764. Here we survey briefly the role of ‘religion’, i.e. Christianity in the ruin of the Roman Empire.


1967 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 273-282 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frederic Hicks

The parochial priests in small Paraguayan towns are generally reputed, in Paraguay, to exercise an extraordinary amount of power and influence over the people of their parishes—to a greater extent, it would seem, than in most other Latin American countries. This is, moreover, despite the fact that the church, as an institution, is considerably weaker, economically and politically, than in all but a handful of such countries. Therefore, what power the individual priest may have can not be viewed as simply an extension of the power of the church. Most urban Paraguayans, including at least some members of the church hierarchy, are inclined to attribute this situation to the alleged superstitious or credulous nature of the Paraguayan peasants. The rural people themselves, on the other hand, are apt to explain the influence of their own local priest, at least, as due to his personal qualities or strength of character, as did the Services when referring to the prestige of the local priest of Tobati.


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