This society’s capacity to turn a blind eye to difficult, sometimes criminal situations is well documented. 

Earlier this week is was reported that severe, back-to-back bleaching has affected two-thirds of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. 

The internet has made our world much smaller than it once seemed. Horizons hardly exist; everything is at hand, in virtual terms at least. 

Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary is one of the most successful businessmen this country has produced. He radiates a can-do, won’t-take-no-for-an-answer determination and positivity.

Even in an age almost inured to the savagery of terrorists or dictators who use chemical weapons against their citizens, the Palm Sunday attacks on two Coptic churches in Egypt, that left 44 people dead and scores more injured, seem exceptional.

A Derry coroner yesterday ruled that a schoolboy Manus Deery, 15, was “totally innocent” when he was killed by a bullet fired by a British soldier.

Even in a Europe challenged by Friday’s fatal truck attack in Stockholm and Saturday night’s controlled explosion in a subway in Norway’s capital Oslo the decision by the Basque separatist group Eta to surrender its weapons to “civil society” in France must be welcomed.

Just a month ago postmasters protested at Dublin’s GPO to try to stop the closure of rural post offices which, they say, will “devastate rural Ireland”.

Last week’s census recorded that one-in-10 people in this Republic had turned their back on any religious alliance or belief. 

UNLESS weather conditions deteriorated dramatically overnight a major sea search is underway off our north west coast.