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A NEW INVESTIGATION by the RTE Investigations Unit into the business behind prostitution in Ireland has found that up to 20 gangs are systematically transporting sex workers around Ireland’s towns.
The programme, entitled Sex for Sale and broadcast this evening, found that every week women are swapped between cars on North King Street in Dublin and driven off to new brothels.
The brothels themselves are to be found countrywide, in the likes of Tallaght, Navan, Drogheda, Ardee, and Cavan town.
The investigation found that the prices being charged in the sex trade in Ireland have fallen significantly in recent times. Almost one third of women advertising across Ireland charge as little as €50 for 30 minutes.
There has also been an increase in high risk practices during the sale of sex, with one in five clients asking a profile set up by the investigations unit to have sex without a condom.
There are roughly 700 escort profiles advertised in Ireland at any one time. Over 98% of those workers are foreign nationals.
A sex trafficking victim, Alexandra from Romania (19), spoke of how she was duped into travelling to Dublin for a job. She was taken from Dublin Airport to a hotel in Sligo where she was held against her will and told that she would have to work as a prostitute to pay off the cost of her travel.
The programme named Letterkenny, Donegal as being a place where prostitution is in high demand.
In 2014 gardaí carried out a number of raids at apartment blocks in the town which saw five women charged for working in a brothel. The women were deported to Romania.
In 2015, at least two of the five women were back working in Letterkenny.
One of the women was to be found working just doors away from the site of her initial arrest the year before.
A 24-hour surveillance of a specific brothel on Dominic Street in Dublin found that 14 different men visited the building for sex during that period.
In September, an alliance representing sex workers in Ireland criticised the imminent criminalisation of paying for sex in Ireland, claiming that the new law will do the opposite of protecting women.
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I thought there already was a book about the life of jesus…
Mike
Great comment. I believe there are thousand of books written about Julius Caesar. What is your point or do you just like seeing your name in print?
Garry, I think he is referring to the so called bible. But you missed that due to an insulting rant as per usual.
And I didn’t know the pope was a ghost writer of fantasy fiction now. Those collection plates must be empty in a Sunday.
Yes, Mike, but this new one is ‘infallible,’ it has even corrected the ‘ancient truth’ about the date of Christ’s birth! I wonder what more needs correction? I mean, can we rely on the teachings of the Fathers of the Church or Tradition? Or the many contributors to the Bible? No doubt some inspired expert will come up with a rational and convincing explanation of why the black is really white!
Actually there are four, but they’re not quite consistent with each other. Three of them don’t have enough zombies or earthquakes.
I wonder has he updated the bit from the sermon on the mount where he said:-
‘Blessed are the accumulating sacred foetal cells, for they shalt hold precedence over the lives of women, who art but spare ribs in the first place.’?
Jesus was a zombie!
Just in time for Christmas. No doubt it’ll top the Fiction Best Seller list…
The Harry potter series was better. More believable anyway.
I suppose it’s a case of ‘whatever turns you on!’
I hear its full of sex, drugs and rock and roll.
Isn’t everything?
Monsignor Georg Gaenswin !!! I just loved his “Rhapsody in Blue”
@Martin I know, isn’t it great!
The rebranding of Jesus!
Naw, John…thats the Vatican you’re thinking of.
When you have read it let us know.
Nice to see he’s found a hobby as a fiction writer instead of concentrating on changing the church’s stance on modern issues. Although long may the drift out of modern culture by the church continue. Humankind is far better without religion.
Also, If pope benedict had an enema they could bury him in a matchbox
Would you share it with him?
Share what?
For it is written..’Love your enema’.
i hear the main character dies in the end!
Ah come on, at least use spoiler tags.
Ehhhhh, he didnt exactly die…..in the end. maybe thats all revealed in book 3?
You will love this third book Abi. Not saying any more.
He comes back to life again 2 days later, thus fulfilling the prophecy that he would come back to life 3 days later.
so they rip off harry potter??
I hope he gets that b4stard Judas back, and in 3D too!!!
I heard he rose again!
Did ye ever here do much bullshit in all you life !
Yes, you should look at Scientology or Mormonism. :)
No, but we await your contribution.
A chap of this name appears in historical records. The rest is made up by the church from around 450AD when a flesh and blood man wanted to consolidate his position of power within the church and to ensure that the church would become more powerful and wealthy.
Give us your money kings and princes, that’ll get you into heaven and you needn’t fear this wrath of god thing that we just made up.
The church is still at it then with ths book – more revenue. However I’m sure the intentions are good.
Hi Paul,
Geniunly intersted in checking out these historical records. Do you have a link or a lead I could look up?
Also if there is anywhere to read up on the early history of the church, could be interesting.
Consult the universal source of all wisdom – Google.
Check up on the ‘Historical Jesus.’ There is a lot of research which suggests there is no evidence he existed at all.
Cheers
Actually, there is a good historical assessment of the evidence and cast by a Palestinian raised writer, Gordon Thomas. It was published in 1987.
So just to be clear Paul your view on the early church is that in 450 they said “You know what our religion needs? An actual deity..lets use the random guy we’ve been worshipping anyway for the last few centuries”?.
This would mean the gregorian calendar is a few years out so its more like 2016 A.D now instead of 2012, and that in turn would mean the mayan prediction for the worlds end was a few years ago not this year! Phew..thats fantastic news!!
I was taught that Jesus was born in September but the Catholic church changed the celebration day to coincide with a pagan festival to subsume it.
Maybe the Pope should concentrate on selling off the Vatican’s assets and actually practice what this Jesus character is suppose to be about helping the sick poor and needy.
This Organisation is rotten to the core teaching outdated malarkey.How anyone can support this shower beggars belief.I doubt Jesus would approve of the Catholic Corporation legacy of corruption and abuse.
Science is the only show in town not irrational illogical fairytales.
If he came back a little later he’d have ascended into heaven on a pillar of smoke from his burning stake..after the Inquisition had shaken him down for opposing their imperial crusades.
JC was originally tortured and executed for heresy against the Judean papacy of Caiaphas.
They then deified the man to incorporate his persona into their box of priest-craft tricks for mass-hypnosis. Thats Mass hypnosis.
Jesus Trilogy? Ok! Let’s start with Episode IV
Episode IV: A New Testament Hope
Episode V: The Roman Empire Strikes Back
Episode VI: Return of the Jesus
When are we getting the prequels?
“Once upon a time, in the Middle East, lived One Man!” (Movie trailer voice)
How exactly can they write about this men….if he even existed?
They don’t know for a fact when he was actually born…no it wasn’t the 25th Dec, so how can they then claim he was born years earlier then they previously guessed?
They also don’t know pretty much anything of his life between say 1 and 20/30 years of age.
if he even existed?
Petr, there is no evidence Jesus existed. If there is bring it on.
Ok so lets saw some guy called Jesus did exist who went around pulling scams on people with his old water to wine switcharoo amongst other party tricks, how in the name of Moses did he not have his own marketing manager and publicist to write his own book. Maybe they just couldn’t arranged a date to meet. I thought you said the 22/12/0033 . No buddy I meant the 22/12/0030. I really must get my printing company to get the dates sorted out for these calendars. There a nice little earner
Don’t think so Petr, I’ve watched documentaries that systematically disproved any evidence of his existence leaving nothing of proof that he ever existed as anything other than a fictional character on some paper
The name Jesus is translation of ‘Joshua’ which was a very common name in Palestine two thousand years ago. In Hebrew it was ‘Yeshua’ and when translated to Greek it was Iesous. The Greek Iesous translated into Latin is Iesus which became Jesus.
The word ‘Christ’ is actually not a name but a title. It is derived from the Greek word ‘Christos’ which meant ‘anointed’ and was a translation from Hebrew ‘Masiah’ which meant Messiah.
Overall, there would be no historical record of ‘Jesus Christ’ because in Palestine two thousand years ago the name/title would not have existed.
Whether there was a man who lived and influenced the Christian Gospel, I do not know. But what is in the Gospels certainly should not be taken as literal. There is no God so logically there can be no Son of God.
Dam. Had to red thumb my own post due to poor grammar. Sorry baby Jesus or is it toddler Jesus
The odd thing is that every major point in Jesus’ life has a striking similarity to many gods that came before him. Like Horus for example. All seems a bit stitched together to get the others involved.
Apparantly it was a great time for prophets, the whole region was like a hugh Speaker’s Corner with every dog and divel expounding his favourite fiction all over the place. The depiction of it in Monty Python’s Life of Christ is probably more accurate than any put about by the church. He could have been any of them, lots of them were probably even called Joshua – it would have been near the top of the Nazareth Times baby names list.
David Kearney, sssshhh don’t point out stuff like that it really upsets people when they are told they just copied other religions….and they did! :)
If anyone is interested Prof Bart Ehrman of Stanford University is a leading scholar on the New Testament and has some interesting insights into early Christianity and the New Testament. He is a former evangelical Christian whose studies of the NT have led him casting doubt as to the existence of Jesus. Some of his talks are on Youtube he makes some interesting points on the gospels and how they have been misused by Christianity.
Multiple quotes eg. “Love the Higher Mind (no human knows it all) of the universe, and love your neighbour as yourself”
@ D. Kearney; I watched a film last night called ‘The Man From Earth’.
Lead character mentions how he spread Buddhist teachings to people in the West (Israel) and they wanted him to be the ‘son of god’ so badly.
Life of Brian: (Brian) “Go away!”
(Followers) “How shall we go away?”
(Brian, exasperated) “Just p**s off!!” :)
How can somebody, ok the Pope , write a trilogy about somebody who lived give or take 2000 years ago and say that the time frame is out by a few years , expect to take his as gospel!!!
I assume if I look for it in a book shop it will be under fiction!.
Ryan
My comments address the usual anti everything and incoherent lobby that appears daily on these pages. Whether it is politicians or business men or priests or doctors the only thing safe here is the Extreme Left who infest the place like wood worm in the legs of an old piano stool.
Why shouldn’t a doctrinal scholar at the level of the Vicar of Rome commit his knowledge and research on the subject of Jesus Christ to paper without the vomit of criticism that emanates from people aforementioned.
Those critics who declare themselves as anti religion or atheists should simply mind their own business and confine themselves to the study of their own preserve. Gestis censere!
Lets make adeal Garry.
The vicar backs out of medical issues…and we lay off his flights of fancy.
Fair?
I suggest you take your own advice first there Garry before dishing your ideals on others who quite simply couldn’t give a flying priest frock what you, the pope or JC himself has to say! But I’ll say a prayer for you and light a candle in the hope that you may see the light and the error of your ways and may a fictional character in the sky grant you devine presence behind a set of pearly white gates forever in the knowing that you are free from satan’s lair where dirty aul peado priest will rot and burn. That do ya or would you like my fist born too?
@ Garry. Biblical Scholars only have to read one book. We the rational people of Earth require much higher standards of those that wish to be known as scholars.
Garry (two r’s) is here preaching ‘live and let live’. Seriously? The church has muscled its pious and pompous way into the lives of Irish people, but shame on us for speaking out. If the church could just quiet down and mind ‘it’s’ own business, I think you’ll find its opponents will reciprocate. Alas, this is not the way of this meddling organization. As more people become educated and knowledgeable, the church will shrivel. It’s happening already.
You must be kidding! We’re about to have a Federal Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse here in Australia, demanded by a public clamouring for an end to the coverup, payoffs & political deals. Promoting the Catholic Church in any way, including via commercially touted Papal books, should be derided, until the Church has cleaned house, vowed to obey the law & aided in the prosecution of offenders. Police in Victoria have over 600 cases of child sexual abuse on their books that were never investigated, due to orders from above…….and not far enough above to be granted absolution either! Organised religion isn’t divine, it’s run by humans & is corrupt, greedy, deviant- ridden & psychopathic, as one would expect whenever secret rules, closed hearings & sagely whispers become the substitute for transparency, honesty, decency & justice!
I wonder does the relationship between Joseph and Mary get a mention – the marital relationship that is?
Poor Joseph, God must have been a hard act to follow. And when Joseph and Mary were getting their … ahem, marital mojo up and running did Joseph feel a bit put out when Mary screamed ‘Oh God, Oh God’ ?
Needs to be asked … only saying.
That an interesting take on the original Big Bang theory there, Andrew.
Puts a whole new meaning into the term ‘shooting-stars’.
Andrew very logical questions. blunt & brutal but logical!
cashing in??
Christianity: The belief that some cosmic Jewish zombie can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him that you accept him as your master so he can remove an evil force that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree. Makes perfect sense.
Cool, loads of people who do not believe in Christianity moaning that someone who does believe in Christianity wrote a book around his beliefs.
And there’s always one who points that out! Peats for peats sake
“Pete’s”
I suppose you gotta eat something!
Could be a spiritual hunger.
Pizza?
There’s a killer twist at the end…
Catholics need confession to allow them carry on behaving as they do. Ireland is typical of a catholic fundamentalist country ie it has one of the highest rates of incest in Europe, it has the highest rate of child sex abuse recorded by priests, and we have 1 in 5 suffer domestic violence. And people are proud to be Irish. It means that there are at least 30 politicians who have sex with their kids or beat their partners. Of course the catholic ethos is alive and well here – people confess and then carry on as before. .
May god forgive ye! :)
That seems to leave you as an example to the rest of us!
God help us all so – us Protestant, Catholic, Jew and Presbyterians, HIndus, Moslems, etc., etc.
What sort of an idiot equates Ireland with Catholic nowadays?
@peepingass
Certain employees of Galway University Hospital, apparently.
This is a headline straight from ‘The Onion’….sadly, the story is not as funny. such guff
There was sex, drugs and rock n’ roll in the bible…. jesus got laid in the toomb…… ill get my coat, taxi.
isn’t so hip and cool to slag off the church wow such insight …
can I ask is there a lould pop noise when you pull your head out of your ass.
Tom, is there any comment above that you dislike BUT you agree causes you a problem with your belief? For instance, there’s no historical evidence Jesus existed.
You have to accept, and learn to live with the fact, that to Non-Believers/Atheists/Freethinkers etc there is NO difference between a Harry Potter book and the bible and therefore we find it hilarious that grown adults can’t see this. I coped on when I was 13, how come you haven’t?
@ Amy croffey: why are you allowing this thread become so abusive and offensive to people who believe in Jesus Christ? Or was it posted purposely for atheists to have a laugh at?
in fairness the story is news, people can comment on it if they wish. You don’t have to agree with everything said.
People are also allowed to have a different view on a subject, for example I find anti-abortion people’s views very offensive on other storys but I don’t ask for thejournal.ie to delete them.
It’s news? How many other book launches has the Journal covered ? Any other biographies I can see get thrown in the Daily Edge. But it’s a good excuse to give the usual anti-theist commenters some fulfilment. And t works for the Journal in fairness. This “news” already has more comments than most of the actual important world events in the other stories
That’s the sad part about religion. You can poke fun at politicians but I can’t poke fun at religion? Why should religion be exempt from Freethought and open discussion? No one is personally attacking you and it’s a shame…
“To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize.”
― Voltaire
Kev Elliott – have you thought of swanning off and making fun of muslims lately? If not you are about as one sided and ignorant as the claims you place against christianity. Go, i dare you to go and spend as much effort being as offensive to them.. or are you cursed with a school bully mentality, only picking on those you know wont turn around and snot you? hypocrite..
Julian Dods – you are three months behind and a little confused. Maybe you should read my comment again
Still won’t beat 50 Shades
Does all this adjusting of time mean I’m 2 years younger? :)
I presume this is an autobiography and the pope is merely ghost writing?
Is this the one where Jesus sells out and goes on the XFactor? And people starting using him in advertisements?
Whhoohhoooo the catholic church starts loosing its power and bad bad things come out – quickly lets write a book to regain the control and write it how we need it!!!! If you look into history it is KNOWN that Jesus was not the long haired bark made sandals wearing angel walking the earth but a real “hippy” with NEW AGE ideas for his time like Hiippies for example and he NEVER had the intention to build a religion! He was an amazing guy and was very lonely as he was never taken serious and ridicouled – really nothing has changed today! So the bible is man made, church made and power made anyway – but that is not allowed to say of course! But people who are openminded and DARE to look over the borders for once will know that anyway!!! All power and fear of thinking for yourself by people panickly holding on to the catholic church, churches in general!!!
I wait now for HOW many thumbs down I will get ;-)
I suspect that the majority of comments concerning the existence/non-existence of Jesus Christ lack substantial evidence. It would be interesting to know how many of those offering opinions have actually spent years researching theological commentary to ascertain the whether their notions are justified. Until they have, it would be polite not to ‘assume’ that their somewhat immature perceptions are correct.
Interesting that the Pope not only acknowledges errors in the Bible but chooses to correct them. As for Monsignor Georg Gaenswin, let me quote my son: “I’ll say this for the Pope – he had nice taste in men. His fella is kinda hawt.”
I was living in Rome when Benny got his pointy hat and red prada shoes. It was kinda common knowledge about him and wotsisface :)
lol jesus: What adults cling to once they find out santa clause is a mother gooserie. Fairy Tale. Lie.. meh
Was the sheep taken out of the story because they were sexually abused? I reckon it’s another cover up!
that’d be the same as Sherlock Holmes’ biography.
John Prine released Jesus the missing years already. !
Well I’m a father too. But only Bono thinks he’s God well actually Michael O’Leary does too. To believe this stuff is like believing in fairies or Santa clause. Bull. Thank God I’m an atheist
This whiffs of desperation. Only celebs release paperback books in time for the Christmas rush, not Popes. Will he be doing signing in Easons?
Bit Like Irish History changed to suit by revisionists..
have your say