'A crucial text' -- Rev Bill Shaw, CEO of 174 Trust, Belfast. 'Touching thoughtful collection of rich testimonies' -- Prof Maggie Scull, Syracuse University, London. The working-class community of Ardoyne has been described as a Catholic and Nationalist island within the Protestant Unionist sea of North Belfast. No other community suffered as much during the Troubles as Ardoyne. During the three-day period of 14--16 August 1969, stoked by the Battle of the Bogside in Derry, long-lived tensions in the area boiled over into riots. Streets became battlefields, houses went up in fire, and the first of many lives were lost. Ardoyne'69: Stories of Struggle and Hope explores the stories of 14 people who share one experience in common the violence of 14, 15 and 16 August 1969. The book highlights their memories, but also asks how they interpreted the violent events they witnessed, and what impact these events had upon their subsequent lives. It illustrates how people from the one community who experienced a common event have different memories, interpretations and reactions to what they saw. Stories come from people as varied as IRA prisoners and a local teacher to an RUC officer, an Irish Times journalist, a former Director General of RTE and a former President of Ireland. Illustrated by contemporary photographs, Ardoyne '69: Stories of Struggle and Hope is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand how seismic events can shape our lives in radically different ways.

Ardoyne '69: Stories of Struggle and Hope

Biographies & Memoirs

Brian McKee

Historical

Red Stripe Press

Eight years ago the popular and outspoken priest Tony Flannery was withdrawn from his ministry by his religious congregation, the Redemptorists, under orders from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in the Vatican. The CDF took issue with some of his writings, saying they were heretical. He was forbidden to perform priestly duties, or to write any articles or give interviews. Refusing to submit to this sentence, the intervening eight years have given him a greater degree of freedom of thought and action than he had ever experienced during his life as a priest in ministry. From the Outside is a product of what he has ascertained and come to believe during those years. The Church is facing many challenges. A great many people are leaving or have left; priest numbers are declining; clerical sex abuse still festers; women are excluded from ministry and decision-making, and that is becoming more and more of an anomaly as time goes by. Leadership in the Church seems incapable of dealing with these challenges, leaving the Church with a serious credibility issue. Along with these issues, From the Outside also deals with a much more fundamental and intractable problem, namely the problem of Church doctrine. Many of what are regarded as fundamental doctrines in the Church date from the early centuries of Christianity. To hold that what was defined about God over fifteen hundred years ago must be accepted without question in the twenty-first century is no longer credible. Flannery outlines what needs to be changed, both in the content and language of doctrine, and in the images and metaphors used. Challenging and controversial, From the Outside asks the Church leadership to look again at some of its basic doctrines. Change is needed.

From the Outside: Rethinking Church Doctrine

Religion & Spirituality

Tony Flannery

Christian Books & Bibles

“Memories are strange entities. They are the thickened skin we build our lives around, the hidden vertebrae of our outward existence, until one day a familiar smell, a chance word or a sidelong glance and boom!” What would you do if you found yourself pregnant, at fifteen years of age, in the early 1970s – in Ireland? It is almost impossible for us to imagine what life was like for young women who found themselves in this position back then. Girls Like You tells the story of ‘Margaret’, the name assigned to the author while in Bessborough House Mother and Baby Home. After spending seven months in the home ‘Margaret’ gave birth to a baby girl in September 1973. The following year, finding herself pregnant again, she made her way to England where her son was born in Guy’s Hospital, London. Against all the odds she brought her daughter home from Cork. Her son was given up for adoption in London. Her story, written in memoir form, shines a light on family and society in twentieth-century Ireland. It highlights the powerlessness and silencing of women in a time when Church and State wielded ultimate power over their personal lives, a time where, in the name of keeping the family unit shame-free, women were separated from their children and siblings grew up without any knowledge of each other. Written with pathos and humour, Girls Like You is a reflection on growing up in the early 1970s in the Irish Midlands. It is a story of love and loss, secrecy and abandonment, forgiveness and integration. It deals with the fallout of this period of Irish history on one individual and her immediate family while exposing the cost of an Irish solution to an Irish problem, a cost which still reverberates in society today as the truth slowly trickles out.

Girls Like You: The Long Road Back from Bessborough

Jacinta O’Connell

Know Your Place is a lovingly illustrated exploration of Irish place names that will bring you to all four corners of the island, learning the hidden stories behind the towns and villages of Ireland, by exploring the history of individual place names and how they have changed over time. It is an exploration, and not an all-embracing compendium, discussing a selection of place names from throughout the 32 counties.

Know Your Place: An Exploration of the Place Names of Ireland

History

O'Dochartaigh, Seoirse

Europe

Eyewitness Bloody Sunday: 25th anniversary edition

Mullan, Don

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