A retired pastor has been convicted for preaching a sermon on divine love within one of Northern Ireland’s controversial abortion ‘safety’ zones.
The former President of the Association of Baptist Churches in Ireland, Clive Johnston, 78, was arrested last year as he was holding an open-air service on the fringes of a buffer zone opposite Coleraine’s Causeway Hospital which conducts abortions. He did not mention the abortion law but his presence was still deemed a violation of the law leading to his arrest.
The grandfather of seven – who had never been in trouble with the police – now faces a criminal record and £450 in fines
After being found guilty at Coleraine Magistrates court, Pastor Johnston called it a “dark day for Christian freedom”.
Director of the Christian Institute, Ciarán Kelly, called the verdict “creeping censorship”.
“If the ruling stands it will represent a shocking new restriction on freedom of religion and freedom of speech so we will be helping Clive to consider the options for appeal.”
The French Senate is debating a bill to legalise assisted suicide after having rejected an earlier version of the same legislation in January.
The proposal would allow someone with a terminal or incurable illness to request lethal medication, usually to administer themselves, although if they are not capable it can be administered by a medical professional, which is euthanasia.
Five conditions must be met: Legal adulthood, free and informed consent, an incurable illness with a life-threatening prognosis, suffering resistant to treatment, and stable residence in France to prevent “death tourism.” Elsewhere when euthanasia and assisted suicide are introduced, the number availing of the procedures almost always increases rapidly and the eligibility grounds expand.
Bishop Marc Aillet of Bayonne, Lescar, and Oloron sent a letter to his diocese, calling on Catholics to oppose the legislation, saying it is “extremely serious” and seeks to “abolish the prohibition against killing upon which life in society has always rested.”
“[T]he final adoption of this bill could only encourage the poorest or most vulnerable patients who lack access to palliative care, or so-called ‘eligible’ individuals who fear being a burden on their families, the medical community, or the social security budget, to resort to assisted suicide or euthanasia,” he said.
The number of young Spaniards who identify as Catholic has surged by almost 50% in a mere five years, according to a new report.
This increase coincides with a reduction in explicitly non-religious positions.
The Young Spaniards 2026 report, which analyses the main trends among young people in areas such as values, education, and politics, confirms a trend seen in many other countries around the world: the increased importance of religion and spirituality among the youth.
The report also found that 38.4% of young people consider religion “quite or very important” in their lives, the highest figure in the entire historical series.
A new report by Amnesty International details brutal attacks on Christians by Islamic militants in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
Incidents of terrorism perpetrated against Christians in the area have also long been documented by the Catholic charity, Aid to the Church in Need.
Published Tuesday, Amnesty’s report begins by detailing a massacre of over 60 mourners at a funeral wake in Ntoyo, the province of North Kivu, in September 2025. One eye-witness told researchers: “I had never seen so many bodies”.
It also highlighted an attack on a church in Komanda, Ituri on July 27th 2025 where at least 40 people were murdered during a prayer vigil.
The report says a large part of the militant group’s messaging and propaganda frames its attacks as targeting Christians, and the vast majority of victims are Christian, reflecting the composition of the local population, but they have also attacked Muslims they consider unfaithful to Islam.
The author’s of the report called for more action from both the DRC Government and the international community.
Pope Leo XIV has convened bishops from around the world for an October summit in Rome to address the global crisis in marriage, the Holy See confirmed.
The high-level meeting will bring together the presidents of bishops’ conferences to examine declining marriage rates, rising cohabitation and growing reluctance among young people to form families.
These are issues that the Pope has identified as a matter of urgent concern for both Church and society.
Meanwhile, the lead Irish Bishop on Marriage and the Family said the latest CSO data, showing fewer couples getting married in Ireland year-on-year, is a “worrying trend” and everyone, including policymakers in Government, “ought to be seriously concerned”.
Bishop Denis Nulty said marriage “is positively correlated with stability in families and that of wider society in general”.
He noted the work done by the Catholic Agency, Accord, to prepare couples for married life, but said more help is needed.
“No doubt but that the decline in marriage numbers is a policy area meriting immediate State intervention, and investment, in the interest of the common good.”
Pro Life leaders have slammed the Social Democrats for introducing a radical abortion bill to remove the last remaining protections for unborn children.
The bill takes aim at the three-day wait which allows a woman time to think through her request for an abortion. It also removes time limits on what qualifies as a so-called ‘fatal-foetal abnormality’, removes conscience protections, and removes the threat of prosecution against medics for illegal abortions.
In a statement, Senator Sarah O’Reilly, of pro-life party Aontú, said the three-day wait provides a “vital space for reflection at a time of immense pressure and vulnerability”.
“The reality is that some women are unsure, some feel overwhelmed, and some feel they have no real alternative. That short pause can be the only moment they have to breathe, to think, and to reconsider,” she said.
Eilís Mulroy of the Pro Life Campaign called the bill “not only sad but disgraceful”.
Meanwhile, thousands attended the annual March for Life in Dublin on Monday.
Speakers voiced their alarm at the rising figures—10,852 abortions were carried out in Ireland in 2024 alone—and called for alternative ”life affirming” supports to be made available to women.
Britain is at a population “turning point” as deaths will outnumber births for the first time this year, according to projections by the Office for National Statistics.
That trend is expected to continue into the future, the agency found, although small annual population increases will still occur up to 2034 due to net inward migration.
The present population predictions, however, are much lower than they were two years ago, reflecting the recent sharp fall in net migration, as well as lower fertility rates expected in the future.
Charlie McCurdy, a senior economist at the Resolution Foundation, said the latest projections put Britain at a “demographic turning point”.
“This slower population growth will also reduce the size of the workforce and consequently lower tax receipts, adding up to £3 billion a year to borrowing by 2030.”
The rate of marriage in Ireland has fallen to a new low of 3.6 adults per thousand people marrying annually which is also below the EU average of 3.9. It has fallen from 4.7 in 2015 and over 7 in the 1970s.
New figures from the Central Statistics Office show there were 19,274 opposite-sex marriages registered in Ireland last year, and 624 same-sex marriages.
The marriage rate was 3.8 in 2024.
The Irish rate first dipped below the EU average in 2020 during the outbreak of the covid pandemic. It has remained there every year since except for 2022.
In what has been hailed as a stunning victory for freedom of speech and common sense in Scotland, a judge has dismissed criminal charges against a 75-year-old grandmother, who was arrested for offering consensual conversation in an abortion “buffer zone”.
Rose Docherty was the first person to be criminally charged under Scotland’s 2024 abortion-exclusion zone law.
Her arrest sparked expressions of concern in the UK and around the world, including from the Scottish Catholic Bishops’ Conference and from the US State Department, who described it as “another egregious example of the tyrannical suppression of free speech happening across Europe”.
Reacting to the ruling, Rose Docherty commented: “This verdict is a major victory for free speech in Scotland and the UK. It shows that peacefully offering consensual conversation on a public street, which is all I have ever done, can never be a crime”.
There has been a surge in popularity in both explicitly religious books and other literary works that reference religious ideas and themes.
Last year, in Britain, there was a 10.5 per cent rise in the sales of books in the “Religion” category, according to figures from the publisher SPCK Group. Bible sales, in particular, are climbing to record highs – up 106 per cent since 2019.
TV personality Bear Grylls’s “The Greatest Story Ever Told” topped hardback bestseller lists last year.
Fiction writers are also more inclined to use religious themes into their stories: the retired priest Richard Coles is finding enormous success with his crime series, The Canon Clement Mysteries. Poet Martha Sprackland is about to release a new translation of writings by the 16th-century mystic John of the Cross.
Penguin Random House recently launched its first Christian imprint, Ebury Vine.
Three of its first four books have charted in the New York Times bestsellers list.
Commissioning editor Charisa Gunasekera believes sales are being driven by Gen Z readers, especially those “who haven’t been raised in religious environments, and are trying to find a deeper wisdom at a time that feels increasingly uncertain. They’re looking for comfort and guidance and peace.”
