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Paedophile priest Brendan Smyth leaving Limavady Courthouse in 1997. Smyth was treated numerous times by psychiatrists - all before 1975

Patricia Casey: Psychiatrists must take share of blame on abuse

The debate about whether paedophilia should continue to be regarded as a psychiatric disorder has recently resurfaced

Medb Ruane: The art of selling us short: can Gabriel really make a difference?

By Medb Ruane

Who is Gabriel Byrne? As of this Paddy's week, the actor is Ireland's first cultural ambassador to the USA. You don't have to talk nice to him or call him 'Excellency,' unless you want to. Anyways, the job's honourary so he won't be paid.

Bruce Arnold: Politicians share blame for turning blind eye to abuse

By BRUCE ARNOLD

The silence of our politicians is as shameful as Cardinal Brady professes himself to be. They have had nothing whatever to say about their part in the abuse of children and their responsibility for the inadequacies in the law, or for the failure of the law to be implemented.

Mary Kenny: 'A bored housewife nowadays has only herself to blame'

By Mary Kenny

I was sorry I had to turn down an invitation from TCD's eminent College Historical Society to speak on the motion that "This House Believes that the Modern Irish Woman Has No Need of a Women's Movement".

James Downey: Greens should go down with their colours flying

By James Downey

FIANNA Fail never liked the idea of appointing an ombudsman to investigate and remedy injustices inflicted on citizens by the bureaucracy. And nobody liked it less than Charles J Haughey.

David Robbins: From rashers to kohlrabi, it's good to talk... about food

By David Robbins

In my mother's house, there was one weekly event awaited with more eagerness than all others. And I don't mean Sunday Mass, or the 3.30 at Haydock, though these were much anticipated, too.

Bishops conducted torch-light procession down a cul-de-sac

The year 1975 is in the news as the year that Cardinal Sean Brady, then a Cavan school-master and canon lawyer, imposed a vow of secrecy on two children about their horrendous experiences of being raped by Norbertine monk, Brendan Smyth.

The outsider who believed he was infallible

Charisma is hard to define but we all know it when we encounter it. Sean FitzPatrick belongs to that lucky group of men and women who ooze this rare quality, which has allowed him to charm everybody from former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern to the Financial Times columnist Mrs Moneypenny, who cooed recently that he was Ireland's best-looking businessman.

The €1m price of life on our seas

To fishermen and sailors who travel along the south-east coast, it is a cost-cutting measure that will inevitably lead to lives being lost and families bereaved.

A new love affair with the old sod

Hillary Clinton looked out over the large assembly of guests, including the man she described as her 'escort', former president Bill who was sitting opposite the Taoiseach at the American Ireland Fund dinner in the heart of Washington DC and nailed her colours of green, white and orange firmly to the mast.