An Irish-based organisation which offers support to children born of Catholic clergy around the world has welcomed Vatican Guidelines on the issue which it says were largely unknown up to now.

Latest: The Bishop of Ossory has apologised following comments made a priest in Co Kilkenny who compared gay people to zombies.

Prominent Atheist and member of the Congregationalist Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, John Hamill has failed in a discrimination action over not getting free Luas travel on the day of the Papal Mass in the Phoenix Park last August.

Police in the North have arrested a 26-year-old man in connection with criminal damage at a church in Antrim.

Two spectacular stained glass windows depicting a series of historical and cultural ‘turning points’ over some 700 years in a West Cork town, have gone on display in the local church.

At least 13 people have been killed after part of a church collapsed in South Africa, according to local media.

Don Cahalane stated in his letter (March 26) concerning the modernising of the Catholic Church that “the Church at its most basic is a community of believers”!

Who would ever, in any sense, regard the lighting of a candle as an act of atonement or reparation? asks Fergus Finlay.

The four-day summit which begins on Thursday is the first time a Pope has called such a large group of senior clergy together to discuss the protection of children in the Church.

Loaded shotguns, knives, and suspected acid have been removed from the grounds of a church in County Derry, following an incident yesterday.

The declaration by Pope Francis, describing paedophilia as one of the “vilest” of crimes, is the clearest indication yet that he may be prepared finally to tackle the issue of child sex abuse within the Catholic Church.

Bishop of Kilmore Leo O’Reilly has retired from his position on health grounds and has had his resignation accepted by Pope Francis.

A Fine Gael minister has called on the Catholic Church to hand over buildings and land to house the elderly.

Two Catholic nuns have admitted embezzling about half a million dollars from a school in California.

A landmark church with links to ‘The Liberator’, Daniel O’Connell, is being allowed to “breathe” for several months as part of an ambitious €1m repair and restoration project.

Lucrative properties intended to be handed over by the Catholic Church to the State by Christmas as compensation will not be released until next summer.

The Catholic Church has handed over little more than half of the compensation money it promised to give victims of repeated physical and sexual abuse, leaving survivors hundreds of millions of euro out of pocket.

Brides who show too much cleavage at their wedding should pay more for their big day, according to Italian priest Fr Cristiano Bobbo.

It’s over. Two thousand years of power and authority, of intellectual superstructure designed to continuously create learned helplessness and obedience may not have ended during the papal visit to Ireland, 2018, but the decline accelerated.

An Irish bishop has said the World Meeting of Families and Pope's visit are an opportunity for Irish society to reflect on the big questions and decisions it faces.

The Taoiseach has called on the church to introduce mandatory reporting for child sexual abuse.

Women should have a bigger role in the Catholic Church, according to a finding in a new survey from the Association of Catholic Priests.

While I welcome the Pope to Ireland, he is also the head of the Vatican, the bizarre state created in a 1929 pact with Mussolini.

Political figures who argue for separation of Church and State are the same ones who are most vocal when it comes to how the Church should be run, says Margaret Hickey.

A man injured when a car went out of control outside a Dublin church last month has died in hospital.

Details down to original glass have survived in this mid 19th century build, but an extension floods it with light, writes Trish Dromey.

"I see [the] Church dying...I mean all we have to do is look at the statistics - most men, and it's an exclusively male order, are now in their 70s."

Update - 6.38pm: The Culture Minister says there was no cause for the attack on her by the Archbishop of Dublin.

Archbishop Diarmuid Martin has responded to comments made by Culture Minister Josepha Madigan that the church needs to embrace change.

Former President Mary Robinson has spoken of how “severe Catholicism” in the aftermath of the 1916 Rising effectively barred women from full citizenship.

Parents and pupils of a Cork school last week reacted angrily after a local priest used his homily during a graduation Mass to back a no vote in the referendum on the Eighth Amendment.

The cherry blossoms are in bloom and Communion season is in full swing, with the girls akin to miniature brides and the boys kitted out like Conor McGregor, writes Elaine Loughlin.

The area has been sealed off and a technical exam is underway.

A church organ may have been the cause of a fire on Monday morning in the 150-year-old Catholic parish church in Kenmare.

A swastika has been removed from a church bell in a north-western town in Germany.

The world has rapidly changed, and we have refused to change with it, writes Fr Brendan Hoban.

Pope Francis will visit Ireland later this year, but will find a different country to that which welcomed his predecessor, Pope John Paul II, almost four decades ago.