The nuns at St Benedict’s Priory in Cobh say the apples from the Bible Garden are a vital source of income for the upkeep of their convent.
The apples are used to make chutneys, which are sold at the convent’s Oasis Tea Room.
The Prioress of the Mount, Mother Catherine, said she and her fellow nuns are distraught following the theft.
Speaking on RTÉ’s Drivetime, Fianna Fáil TD for Cork East, James O’Connor, said he has spoken to gardaí about the theft.
“Our understanding is that a number of other gardens in the area have experienced similar incidents over the weekend,” he said.
The Office of Public Works has agreed to “step in and provide assistance” to the nuns by replacing the stolen fruit with apples from a nearby orchard on an OPW-owned site at Barryscourt Castle in Carrigtwohill.
This assistance will help plug the funding gap for the nuns, he said.
Knock Shrine will not open its grounds on what would normally be its busiest day of the year due to fears about the spread of Covid-19.
In a statement the rector of Knock Shrine, Fr Richard Gibbons, said the Co Mayo venue will not open for the Feast of the Assumption on 15 August due to the escalation of the virus around the country.
Fr Gibbons said during discussions with Church and State bodies it was decided the shrine did not have the resources to deal with the large numbers of people expected.
He said: “As the National Marian Shrine, we have been extra vigilant in living up to our responsibilities amid this pandemic in placing people’s physical and spiritual well-being to the fore.
“I would ask for your understanding and patience at this time.”
The Feast of the Assumption attracts over 20,000 people to Knock every year.
The shrine and its grounds will be closed from 8pm on Friday 14 August to 7am on Sunday 16 August.
Masses will be celebrated online only and behind closed doors at 12pm, 3pm and 7.30pm.
A leading academic has associated pro-natal policies with authoritarian and totalitarian regimes.
Writing on the RTE website, Prof Mary P Corcoran, acknowledges that there is a looming birth crisis both in Ireland and around the world so that countries will no longer replace themselves, and a diminishing number of young people will have to take care of an ever growing elderly population.
After briefly considering immigration as a solution, the Professor of Sociology at Maynooth University then turns to policies that foster the birth rate. Calling it a “more controversial solution”, she says: “History teaches us that pro-natalist policies often have the effect of weaponising childbearing for political ends”. She then name checks Stalin’s Soviet Union, Hitler’s Nazi Germany, and Ceausescu’s Romania as examples.
As contemporary examples, she offers Turkey and Hungary.
The HSE spent €2.9 million providing abortions through GPs in 2019.
This refers only to abortions that took place in the first nine weeks of pregnancy, using drugs prescribed and dispensed by a GP, and does not include surgical abortions which occur only in hospital settings and cater for pregnancies beyond nine weeks.
The figure was confirmed by Geraldine Crowley, Assistant National Director, Primary Care Strategy and Planning in response to a parliamentary question from Carol Nolan TD.
Commenting on the News, Deputy Nolan called the figure “staggering”, especially considering that “an almost equal amount of funding (€3.1million) was allocated for the implementation of the entire National Women and Infants Health Programme (NWIHP) in 2019”.
She continued: “When you put this information, and the recent annual report on the number of abortions that took place in 2019 together, what we now have is an emerging sense of how much abortion is going to ‘cost’ in terms of the loss of human life and the financial resources that could be better spent at the community level”.
“It is also clear however that the fees of €2.9 million do not represent anything like the true financial cost because that number only refers to abortions which took place at 9 weeks or under in a community setting. It takes no account of the costs associated with the delivery of abortion ‘services’ beyond 9 weeks and which have to take place in our maternity hospitals.”
A new Pew Research Center survey finds that U.S. adults overwhelmingly say houses of worship should be required to follow the same rules about social distancing and large gatherings as other organizations or businesses in their local area. About eight-in-ten Americans (79%) take this position, four times the share (19%) who think houses of worship should be allowed more flexibility than other kinds of establishments.
This view was shared by the vast majority of believers, with three-quarters of US Christians saying churches should be subject to the same rules as other businesses.
In addition, many Americans who regularly attend religious services express support for instituting a variety of restrictions and modifications at their own places of worship. At the time the survey was conducted (July 13 to 19), only 13% said their house of worship should be open to the public just as it was before the outbreak.
Speaking on RTE Radio 1 Thursday, Des O’Neill, Professor of Geriatric Medicine at Tallaght Hospital, said there are major studies that show the vast majority of people die in a dignified way, with appropriate care and support.
He told Sarah McInerney that people in the caring professions are becoming increasingly concerned by the “inappropriate and inaccurate simplifications” of those advocating for what they euphemistically term “death with dignity”.
He said that the introduction of euthanasia and assisted-suicide in places like the Netherlands really undercuts “positive, promoting, caring, supportive ethics”, and he cited the recent case of a patient suffering with dementia who had to be restrained while receiving a lethal injection.
Professor O’Neil was responding to former Junior Minister, John Halligan, whose 2015 euthanasia bill is being revived in the current Oireachtas by socialist TD, Gino Kenny.
The possibility of a referendum to give adopted children access to their birth records has been raised.
Briefing documents drawn up for Minister for Children Roderic O’Gorman reveal newly emerging cases of illegal birth registrations.
They also signal a referendum may be needed to give adopted people access to information on their birth.
Recent attempts have failed to balance the competing rights of privacy and information to allow full access to records be granted.
In 2018 it emerged that 126 births between 1946 and 1969 had been deliberately and falsely registered, with the names of the adoptive parents incorrectly recorded as the birth parents. That figure has now risen to 151.
“It is understood that there is a high likelihood that a number of High Court proceedings will be taken by individuals affected by illegal registration, and a number of cases have now been instigated,” the note says.
“The impact of being informed that they were the subject of an illegal birth registration has had a considerable impact on many individuals’ wellbeing, and the State’s duty of care should be considered in relation to any future cases. In particular, in some cases, individuals have been informed that they were the subject of an illegal birth registration, but as their birth mother does not consent to the release of her information, they can be told no more.”
Pope Francis has announced that he will begin a new series of general audience talks aimed at helping build “the future that we need.”
“In the next few weeks, I invite you to tackle together the pressing questions that the pandemic has brought to the fore, social ills above all. And we will do it in the light of the Gospel, of the theological virtues and of the principles of the church’s social doctrine,” during his weekly general audience.
“We will explore together how our Catholic social tradition can help the human family heal this world that suffers from serious illnesses,” the pope said.
Over the centuries, the church has developed many social principles “that can help us move forward in preparing the future that we need.”
He said the main principles are: the dignity of the person; the common good; the preferential option for the poor; the universal destination of goods; solidarity; subsidiarity; and care for the planet, “our common home.”
“These principles help the leaders, those responsible for society, to foster growth and also, as in the case of the pandemic, the healing of the personal and social fabric,” he said.
“It is my desire that everyone reflect and work together, as followers of Jesus who heals, to construct a better world, full of hope for future generations,” said Pope Francis.
An attack on a Catholic saint who died while ministering to lepers has been described as ‘outrageous’.
Damien of Molokai was a missionary from Belgium working in Hawaii when he volunteered to serve on a remote island for lepers in 1873, where he contracted the disease himself and died after 11 years.
He was honoured by the State of Hawaii in 1969 with a statue in Washington DC’s Capitol building.
But in an Instagram post to her 6 million followers last week, rising Democratic star, left-wing Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, called him a coloniser—and said the fact that he was honoured, instead of a woman of colour, was a sign of ‘the patriarchy’, and ‘white supremacy’.
Los Angeles Auxiliary Bishop, Robert Barron, however, said the critique of Damien was “crazy”, “outrageous”, “colossally misguided”, “ridiculous” and “insulting”.
He also referenced other recent attacks on churches, statues and heroes of the Christian faith in the US, as Christian Churches are getting engulfed in the rising tide of anger from the political left.
In a response posted to Facebook, he said critiques like those of Representative Ocasio-Cortez showed the poverty of woke politics. He called their categories of judgement “simplistic” as they fail to see the moral heroism of people like St Damien of Molokai.
The new information campaign from the HSE and the Irish Pharmacy Union (IPU) says people should consider masturbating or having ‘phone sex’ or ‘internet sex’ to avoid close contact.
Called ‘Play It Safe!’, people are being informed that they should “only be sexually active with a partner living in your household”.
However, it says: “If you decide to be sexually active with someone living outside of your household, limit it to as few partners as possible, preferably one regular partner”. This contradicts social distancing guidelines.
It adds: “Consider masturbation or remote sexual activity (eg, online) as alternative to physical sexual activity with others.”
The leaflets will be available in pharmacies as part of “sexual health protection packs”, which also include a free promotional condom.
