From Times Online (Tip to Real Clear Religion):
In recent years this most Catholic of European nations has undergone a rapid process of secularisation, robbing the Church of its once-omnipresent authority and making it vulnerable to attack over a series of sex abuse scandals.
Yesterday the hierarchy was taking comfort from an estimated 40,000 pilgrims who made the 700m (2,510ft) ascent, forming queues at peak times. Among them were hundreds of the “New Irish”, the Eastern European Catholics whose faith is reversing the decline in church congregations across Ireland.
Typical of these pilgrims was Miroslawa Gorecka, a 17-year-old from Katowice living in Galway whose mother came to Ireland to work as a doctor.
“For me life would have no meaning without my Catholic faith,” she said.
“I’m not used to this kind of hardship and it’s good to make a sacrifice.”
Official figures for Ireland’s Polish population hover about 100,000 but the true figure is likely to be twice that. They have been joined in the past decade by Latvians, Lithuanians and others…
Full report here.
