Angelus still ringing with controversy 60 years on

SIXTY years ago this month, the Angelus was first broadcast on Radio Éireann at the request of then Archbishop of Dublin John Charles McQuaid.

When the television station opened in the early 1960s, the practice was further extended to include visuals to accompany the sound of the bell tolling.

The practice has been a constant source of debate as to whether the state broadcaster should broadcast, twice daily, a single religious expression of devotion, specific to one religion, to the exclusion of all others.