The High Court has said that the media can report on a landmark case regarding an attempt to recognise surrogacy under Irish law. The genetic parents of two children born to a surrogate mother have taken a case to be recognised as the children’s parents on their birth certificates, the Irish Independent reports. The surrogate...
The Government have met with representatives of the Catholic Church in only their second meeting as part of the “structured dialogue” process set up under the previous administration. The issue of abortion dominated the meeting, according to a report in the Irish Times. The Primate of All Ireland, Cardinal Sean Brady, led the Catholic...
No Catholic primary schools should be handed over to new patron bodies without firm guarantees that the ethos of the remaining schools will be properly respected, one of the country’s leading Catholic educationalists has said. Professor Eamonn Conway (pictured), head of the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at Mary Immaculate, Limerick, made the remarks...
Catholic adoption agencies in Colorado are under threat as a result of a new version of a civil unions bill that no longer protects agencies that believe children should ideally be placed with a mother and a father. The original version of the bill said it “shall not be interpreted to require a child placement...
Religious leaders in Vietnam have expressed serious concern at new regulations laid down by the government there which they fear will impose new restrictions on religious practice. Decree 92, issued by Vietnam’s Communist government in November, went into effect earlier this month and is raising concerns among the nation’s Christians and Buddhists. The new law...
The Catholic bishops of England and Wales have sent a million postcards opposing gay marriage to parishes around the country and are urging parishioners to send them to their MPs. The cards urge MPs to vote against same-sex marriage legislation being introduced into Parliament later this month. They state that marriage between a man and...
Churches have paid too little attention to the damage done to them by decades of widespread family breakdown in the US, according to a new study. Children raised in intact, married families are more likely to be religious than children who were not. The research, published by the Institute for American Values, urges US faith...
The Department of Health in Northern Ireland has confirmed it is appealing a High Court ruling which said that a law banning cohabiting and same-sex couples from adopting constituted ‘unlawful discrimination’ . In response to a question from Green Party MLA Stephen Agnew, Health Minister Edwin Poots said that his department had served notice of...
A woman whose case against Ireland’s prohibition on assisted suicide was rejected by the High Court last week is set to appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court, The Irish Independent reports. Marie Fleming, a 59 year suffering from multiple sclerosis, argued that the ban on assisted suicide infringed her rights under the Constitution and...
The number of Irish children born outside marriage, and who are being raised outside marriage is as high as it is in most other Western countries, according to a new study. In addition, the number of Irish people aged 18-49 who are married is among the lowest in the Western world. Levels of cohabitation are...
