After many skirmishes along the boundaries between Church and State, between traditional faith values and post-modern liberal ones, it appears the question of who should control the Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) in Irish schools may be the one to finally draw a hard, new line in the sand between government and hierarchy. The question...
What effect did Covid-19 have on the number of weddings that took place in Ireland last year compared with 2019? As you can imagine, a very big effect. In fact, the number halved, but the reduction in the number of Catholic weddings was bigger than in the number of civil weddings. Why might that have...
David Quinn of The Iona Institute was on The Hard Shoulder this week discussing new sex education material published by the bishops for use in Catholic primary schools. His main point? Sex education should be in accord with the wishes of parents. If they want it taught through in school through a Catholic lens, it...
It is now more than one year since a very liberal abortion law was introduced in Ireland. Only a minority of GPs are willing to prescribe the abortion pill, and in hospitals, a much smaller number perform abortions. But what kind of reaction do they get from other health workers? According to a new paper...
Atheism often presents itself as a ‘rational’ and ‘tolerant’ alternative to religion. But is this true either in theory or in practice? David Quinn discusses this question with Gerard Casey, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at UCD in the latest Iona Institute video interview. The Iona Institute has just published a new paper by Dr Casey...
In a new report for the Government, the Special Rapporteur on Child Protection has recommended legal recognition of domestic surrogacy arrangements even where the commissioning couple have no genetic connection the child. This gives the natural ties short shrift indeed. The recommendation would allow a given couple to use the sperm of one donor, the...
In many ways, atheism is based on the big bluff that you can have your cake and eat it too. In the latest paper from The Iona Institute, Dr Gerard Casey, former head of the Department of Philosophy at UCD, calls this bluff. The bluff is that you can deny the existence of God, and...
The practice of euthanasia in the Netherlands bares a disturbing comparison with the Nazi era in Germany because it is recreating the category of life ‘deemed unworthy of life’. This is a opinion of a writer in a leading medical journal, especially as the Netherlands allows people who are not dying to avail of assisted...
Public worship is currently banned in Ireland. For the second year, there will be no Easter celebrations due to the ban imposed by the Government. This is exceptional in Europe, where public worship is allowed in almost every country, albeit with various safety measures. (See details below) Since the beginning of the Covid-19 crisis last...
A constant theme of The Iona Institute, indeed one of the chief reasons it was founded, is to point out that family structure matters, and specifically that when mothers and fathers raise their children together, the children are likely to do better in life. A major new report has just been published in the UK...
