René Ostberg lives in Illinois and is currently working toward a master's degree in library and information science at Dominican University. She has written for U.S. Catholic, America and many other publications.

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'Derry Girls' teen characters reach for peace, community and laughs

"Derry Girls," returning to Netflix with its final season, shows a political and religious conflict through the eyes of young girls — a perspective long overdue in representations of Ireland's Troubles and Catholicism.

Book Review

Book details long battle to get justice for Ireland's Magdalene survivors

Book review: The trauma inflicted by the Magdalene laundries lasts to this day. And thanks to the monumentally unwise historical marriage between the Catholic Church and the Irish state, secrecy and denial still prevail.

Book Review

What good is hell in the afterlife? Living through a global plague is hellish enough.

Dinty Moore's new book is packed with down-to-earth humor and clear prose. With devastating deadpan and straightforward, honest storytelling, he skewers the twisted theology that prioritizes belief in a punishing afterlife and inflicts psychic damage on people through guilt and fear.