It’s not hard to imagine the jaws dropping onto desktops when the letter arrived from Culture Minister Nelson McCausland asking museum heads to pay a bit more attention to matters of vital concern to him like the Ulster Scots heritage, the Orange Order and the origin of the universe. On reflection, museum managers might have [...]
Archive for the ‘Religion’ Category
Did Nelson evolve or was he intelligently designed?
Posted in Culture and Society, Politics, Northern Ireland, Religion on May 27, 2010 | 3 Comments »
It’s Ask The People Day
Posted in Belfast, Religion on May 6, 2010 | 1 Comment »
Long Life and Happiness to Sean Brady
Posted in Religion on April 16, 2010 | 1 Comment »
A few private thoughts will have circulated among churchmen and their critics when the news came through on Tuesday night that Cardinal Sean Brady had been rushed to hospital. Those who love and defend the Cardinal, as many do, will have worried that this was the outworking of the pressure put on him by media [...]
Nantes Protest
Posted in Culture and Society, Religion on March 19, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
I saw this protest outside the church of St Nicolas in Nantes last week, March 13. The Catholics on the church steps were conducting a service around an icon, the protesters were objecting to Catholic teaching on abortion and women’s rights, and the police were in the middle. You can hear both the protest chanting [...]
Don’t Wilt, Iris
Posted in Culture and Society, Religion on January 7, 2010 | 1 Comment »
A humanistic view of marital infidelity would ask if both partners should take responsibility for one of them wandering. Lucky Peter Robinson; he gets his wife to take all the blame and then forgives her on national television. Here’s a piece I publish in this morning’s Belfast Telegraph: Part of the indignity for Iris Robinson [...]
The Churches and the Troubles
Posted in Politics, Northern Ireland, Religion on November 16, 2009 | 1 Comment »
One overlooked aspect of the Eames Bradley report on the past was the charge that the churches have a responsibility for sectarianism. [You'll note that there is a new player format here now. It's a bit brash, I know, but I'll find something more suited to the genteel people who visit this site.] Rev Lesley [...]
The Christian Brothers should be banned and their property impounded.
Posted in Culture and Society, Religion on May 27, 2009 | 28 Comments »
No one took responsibility for the rape and brutalisation of children by religious orders when it was happening but there are more ways to respond now than simply by being appalled and swearing it will never happen again. For a start, the orders which were responsible should be disbanded. This will only have token value, [...]
If we can have a Bloomsday we can have a Jesus day. Why not?
Posted in Culture and Society, Religion, Uncategorized on April 10, 2009 | 1 Comment »
One of the telling moments, when you seek to be a detached and cynical atheist, is when you open a copy of the New Testament to read the account of the Last Supper and the crucifixion of Jesus Christ – just for research purposes. For you may have disregarded the myth since you left school [...]
Do humans disappoint the humanists?
Posted in Culture and Society, Religion, Uncategorized on December 20, 2008 | 4 Comments »
There are two separate articles attacking me in the current issue of Humanism Ireland. The humanists are always having a bash at me; it’s because I am a humanist and they are not. It seems that fundamentalist movements like this are always more annoyed with people who nearly completely agree with them, but won’t go [...]
Mary of Nazareth: Is she a virgin? Is she dead?
Posted in Religion on November 25, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Bishops discussing the BVM Here’s one I enjoyed doing for Sunday Sequence: a debate at the Church of Ireland Chaplaincy at QUB on whether Anglicans or Roman Catholics (‘papishes’) have the better understanding to the real nature of Mary of Nazareth.
