This past March I traveled through Northern Ireland as part of a group of 19 students and administrators from New York University’s Gallatin School. We had come to Northern Ireland to gain a better understanding of human rights issues. What I gained an understanding of, however, was how large the gap had become between whatRead more..
Gay Priest Comes Out Father Martin Dolan, a priest at the Church of St Nicholas of Myra in Francis Street in Dublin’s city for 15 years, came out as gay to his parishioners during a Sunday Mass in early January while calling for same-sex marriage equality in advance of the country’s May referendum on theRead more..
The only sign that something happened here last night is the shower of shattered glass spread across the pavement. A few hours after a pregnant Pakistani woman and her brother-in-law moved in to this house in the Village area of south Belfast, a large plank of wood was hurled through their living room window, forcingRead more..
When Bill Clinton took the stage in Dundalk on his final presidential visit to Ireland last December, he could have had no idea how much of a welcome was waiting. In the late 1990s, the border town (population 30,000) had almost shaken off its El Paso image, a legacy from the Troubles, and was workingRead more..
The Irish writer John B. Keane once said of my home town that “they should build a wall around it and let no man in and let no man out.” I don’t know why he said that about An tAonach, which means Fair or Market place. (The town was named Nenagh by the English duringRead more..
How too long a sacrifice can make a stone of the heart. ℘℘℘ At first, it seemed to be nothing. It was a curled-up dark brown leaf about the size of a good lock of hair and it was preserved in glass in a room in the Fairlow Herbarium in Cambridge, Massachusetts. A typewritten cardRead more..