country:ireland

Almost nine in 10 Catholics in Ireland want priests to be allowed to marry | World news | guardian.co.uk
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/apr/12/catholics-ireland-priests-allowed-married

An overwhelming majority of Catholics in Ireland want priests to be allowed to marry, according to a survey conducted on behalf of the Irish priesthood’s unofficial representative association.

The Association of Catholic Priests’ opinion poll, released on Thursday, found that 87% of Irish Catholics said priests should be allowed to marry.

The survey of 1,000 Catholics questioned over a fortnight in February by Amarach Consulting also discovered that 77% of believers said women should be ordained.

#religion

All the evidence points to sectarian civil war in Syria, but no one wants to admit it | Patrick Cockburn (The Independent)
►http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/patrick-cockburn-all-the-evidence-points-to-sectarian-civil-war-in-sy

The sectarianism of the Syrian opposition is persistently played down by the international media, but power in Syria is distributed along sectarian lines, just as it was in the recent past in Iraq, Lebanon and Ireland. Even supposing an anti-sectarian opposition, democracy in Syria means a loss of power for the Alawites and their allies and a gain for the Sunni. Given that Sunni make up three-quarters of Syria’s 24 million population, their enfranchisement might appear to be no bad thing. Unfortunately, many of the government’s most committed opponents evidently have more fundamental changes in mind than a fairer distribution of power between communities. Core areas of the insurgency, where the Sunni are in the overwhelming majority, increasingly see Alawites, Shia and Christians as heretics to be eliminated. (...) Source: The Independent

Ireland closure of Vatican embassy angers Catholic church leaders | World news | guardian.co.uk
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/04/ireland-closure-vatican-embassy-catholic

The leader of Ireland’s Catholics has criticised the republic’s government for closing its embassy to Vatican City.

Cardinal Sean Brady expressed his “profound disappointment” over the move, which comes after diplomatic clashes this year between the Fine Gael-Labour coalition and the Holy See over the Vatican’s handling of the clerical child sex abuse scandals in Ireland.

#religion

Google investigated for tax evasion - Shifted money off shore | TechEye
►http://news.techeye.net/business/google-investigated-for-tax-evasion#utm_source=thetecheye

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Google had cut its taxes by $3.1 billion in the three years prior using a technique that moves most of its foreign profits through Ireland and the Netherlands to Bermuda.

Amongst the financial geniuses, who bought us the world economic crisis, Google cut its worldwide tax bill by about $1 billion a year using a pair of strategies called the “Double Irish” and “Dutch Sandwich”. These move profits through units in Ireland, the Netherlands and Bermuda.

This meant that it could report an effective tax rate of 18.8 percent in the second quarter, less than half the average combined US and state statutory rate of 39.2 percent.

#évasion #fiscale #impôts #uncut

Want to be a priest? There’s an app for that – CNN Belief Blog - CNN.com Blogs
►http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/10/17/want-to-be-a-priest-theres-an-app-for-that

The Catholic Church in Ireland is going high-tech in a bid to reverse a dramatic decline in the number of priests.

An establishment viewed as a bastion of tradition is turning to a new app to encourage more “applications.” The app, says the church, is “designed to promote vocations to the priesthood.”

#religion

ZCommunications | End Financial Control of European Governance by Susan George | ZNet Article
►http://www.zcommunications.org/contents/179948

What do you think the consequences of these policies will be?

European policies so far are disastrous! They are the same so-called “remedies” that were forced on developing countries in the 1980s, now better known as the “lost decade for development”. The austerity programmes being imposed on Greece, Ireland or Portugal come straight from the neoliberal handbook of Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs), from A to Z.

The result is savage contraction of those economies to an unheard-of degree. When radical privatisation, salary cuts, social spending wipe-outs and so on were imposed in really poor countries like Niger, they actually led to famine and mass deaths. In Europe, we have more leeway, some cushions, but Greece’s economy has already shrunk by more than 5% this year, unemployment has soared with no compensation, small businesses are failing in droves and everything in sight is being privatised.

It’s a criminal policy designed to push workers back into 19th century, to get rid of the social benefits people fought for over many generations. As usual, the rich will escape and international capital will have a heyday with the privatisation possibilities. Ordinary people are paying twice for the financial crisis—first to bail out the banks and now to sacrifice and bring about the ruin of their own countries and livelihoods.

#économie #dette

L’#ours blanc était roux // Polar bear ancestors came from Ireland | Science | The Guardian
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2011/jul/07/polar-bear-ancestors-ireland

Modern polar bears share a distinct DNA sequence, passed down the female line, with their now extinct brown ancestors. However, the same DNA fingerprint is absent from other species of brown bear alive today.

It is thought the link arose from interbreeding between prehistoric polar bears and female brown bears when their paths crossed as the Irish climate cooled.

Ireland’s poisonous blasphemy debate | Padraig Reidy | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jun/24/artwork-blasphemous-blasphemy-laws

Ireland, meanwhile, is facing its first blasphemy controversy since the Fianna Fáil/Green government introduced a new blasphemy law. Buckley’s claim that all Irish people revere Mary chimes dangerously with that law’s definition of blasphemy as something likely to cause “outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of [a] religion”. UCC could yet have a case on its hands.

#irlande #religion #blasphème

Le lien qu’il te faut pour la journée :

Kate Middleton Wedding Dress By Sarah Burton for Alexander McQueen - Fashion Copious
►http://fashioncopious.typepad.com/fashioncopious/2011/04/kate-middleton-wedding-dress-by-sarah-burton-for-alexander-m

The lace appliqué for the bodice and skirt was hand-made by the Royal School of Needlework, based at Hampton Court Palace. The lace design was hand-engineered (appliquéd) using the Carrickmacross lace-making technique, which originated in Ireland in the 1820s. Individual flowers have been hand-cut from lace and hand-engineered onto ivory silk tulle to create a unique and organic design, which incorporates the rose, thistle, daffodil and shamrock.

(À part ça, si tu veux savoir, il n’y avait ni Colin Firth, ni Emma Thompson, ni Rowan Atkinson.)

#mode #robe_de_mariage

BBC - Newsnight: Paul Mason: Twenty reasons why it’s kicking off everywhere
►http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/paulmason/2011/02/twenty_reasons_why_its_kicking.html

We’ve had revolution in #Tunisia, #Egypt's Mubarak is teetering; in Yemen, Jordan and Syria suddenly protests have appeared. In Ireland young techno-savvy professionals are agitating for a “Second Republic”; in France the youth from banlieues battled police on the streets to defend the retirement rights of 60-year olds; in Greece striking and rioting have become a national pastime. And in Britain we’ve had riots and student occupations that changed the political mood.

Lessons from Iceland: Coming in from the cold | The Economist
►http://www.economist.com/node/17732935?story_id=17732935&fsrc=scn/tw/te/rss/pe

Iceland has been tough with creditors and kind to itself. Ireland may wish it had done the same

#Islande #Irlande #économie