Look at the statements and homilies made by some of the Irish bishops yesterday following their two-day meeting with Pope Benedict XVI and one thing will be perfectly obvious they just don t understand the problem There is plenty there about sin and repentance God s loving and healing mercy and

There were 1 16 billion baptised Catholics in the world in 2008 up 1 7 19m on the previous year and making up 17 4 of the world s population nbsp according to the latest Annuario Pontificio nbsp In the same period the world s population went from 6 6bn to 6 7bn The Catholic share of tha

Cambridge MA At first I was secretly pleased this past week to come across the Newsweek article entitled ldquo Harvard rsquo s Crisis of Faith Can a secular university embrace religion without sacrificing its soul rdquo The article by Lisa Miller religion editor proposed that Harvard rsquo

nbsp nbsp Mes chers amis nbsp Last night I saw an extraordinary new movie called Lourdes directed by the Austrian filmmaker Jessica Hausner and starring a luminous Sylvie Testud as a more-or-less believing pilgrim who suffers from mulitiple sclerosis nbsp Christine has come to the

Robert Mickens the Tablet s prolific correspondent kindly sent us this special report from the Vatican on the much talked about meeting between the pope and the Irish bishops prompted by that church s widening sex abuse scandal ROBERT MICKENS Special to America ROME ndash Act I of a Vatican-o

Mother Mary Clare Millea answered a number of questions from NCR s John Allen recently and the conversation is worth reading Allen asks some great questions about the next steps the cost of the visitation and whether Cardinal Rode already has made up his mind about the state of Religious life in