I congratulate you (if that is not presumptuous of me) on the moderation and wisdom of your editorial under the heading “Protests in the North” (Opinion, Jan 7).

In your “Safer Road” editorial (Opinion, Jan 2) you write: “It is astounding that after years of campaigning and education, so many people, especially young people, still smoke.”

I wish to comment on Victoria White’s sobering article (Opinion, Jan 3) — “Justice needed for the survivors of and victims of Bethany House abuse”.

We, as a society, are imploding and the time will soon come where people will die; all because we would not deal with the problem as to what brought us to the place nobody wanted to go.

Now that the year-long Gathering celebration has begun it would be an opportune time for the State to suitably commemorate the thousands of Irish who unwillingly became part of the diaspora when they were transported as slaves to the Caribbean and Southern US states during the 17th century.

Minister Simon Coveney was certainly a busy man over the Christmas break.

As Christians, we know God supercedes all law, but some of us overlook this fact. When our law and legislators ignore this standard and direction that God has given us, then evil will triumph.

I think Colette Browne is a bit complacent when she says that the anonymous and unregulated aspects of the role of social media in public debate, and the consequent existence of social media abusers, is confined to ‘a small cohort of offensive boneheads’ and is an issue of no importance (Opinion, Jan 2).

There was I thinking how on earth can someone like Enda Kenny, who has been Taoiseach for nearly two years now, justify accepting an annual salary of €200,000 (before tax free unverified expenses and pension entitlements) when the economy and political system is no different now than it was when he took office, and I dare say if his political mentor Liam Cosgrave were to return to government he wouldn’t notice much difference from when he was Taoiseach.

Michael Clifford (Forum, Dec 29) appears to have strayed into a ‘societal-therapy’ zone, in terms of dealing constructively and productively with the nation’s festering anger quotient.