I'd like to live in Ireland some day

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EphelDuath

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My fiancee and I have always wanted to live in Poland or Ireland or Malta or the Philippines, some place where Catholicism is taken very seriously as part of the culture and you’re unlikely to face bigotry for your beliefs from the mainstream culture.

The problem is, we’re not financially well off. She has a high school degree and is going to a community college/trade school next year. I have a degree in Theology & Religious Studies and have a decent job right now because of it, but it’s very doubtful I’d get anything remotely as good as that anywhere else I could go, considering I was very blessed to have gotten this job (over 60 people applied for it).

Any personal testimonies on people moving to foreign countries with minuscule finances?
 
Wouldn’t bother with Ireland. Jobs are scarce, our young are emigrating in their droves, religion, Catholicism in particular in under concerted attack from all directions…
What is so bad about where you are that you want to leave? You have a job related to your discipline in Theology, trust me, unless you have contacts here already and are moving in the ‘right circles’ your chances of getting a similar job here a next to nowhere. The old ‘not what you know, but who you know’ conundrum.
 
I’m just gonna second the idea that if your looking for a truly Catholic mainstream culture Ireland is not the place to go. :nope: Don’t get me wrong, I love Ireland, and it does have good solid Catholics, but its mainstream culture is hardly Catholic.
I’ve also heard that Poland is slipping a little bit too…
And the Philipines has their own set of problems… I know Philipino woman who works in Europe but sends money back to her family in the Philipines and she is scared to go back and visit because apparantly people coming back (who will be presumed to have more money because they’ve been working abroad) are morelikely to be targeted for a robbery. 🤷
I don’t really know much of anything about Malta, so I can’t say anything for sure, but I’m sure that it too has its own issues. I would seriously look into all of these countries from a realistic point of view to try and learn what it is actually like, the good and the bad, so that you don’t make a huge effort to make such a big transplant only to discover all sorts of issues that you never expected to encounter and be discouraged/depressed by finding them. Do a lot of research before thinking about making such a move, things might not be as idealistic as you think. 🤷
 
I think it might just be easier to be a city on your OWN hill. However, if you decide to go through this plan, do a whole lot of research ahead of time. I once worked at at retail store part time and this woman came up to check out. I offered her the store line of credit as I was supposed to do and she told me that she didn’t want it. She had closed all of her credit cards except her one American Express card because she and her family were moving to Ireland in two days. She was suprised to find out that unless she intended to buy her family’s groceries in the airport, she wasn’t going to have much luck using it anywhere else in Ireland. I hope she had enough time to call the Visa company back!
 
I can’t speak about any specific country, but these sort of threads have come up from time to time. Here is what I remember, in general

One of the major problems of moving to another country is getting permission to work. Some (not all) countries will allow persons to stay long term, so long as they are independently wealthy. But when potential immigrants want to take away jobs from the locals, the welcome mat gets withdrawn.

There seem to be a couple ways around that. One is to be an entrepreneur who can demonstrate to authorities that s/he has the skills and resources to successfully create a business which will not only be self-sustaining, but employ others.

Another possibility is to have job skills which are badly needed in the host country. These will vary by country, so require some investigation.

Setting aside the work question, most countries, before they let you through customs, want to know you have enough money to pay your bills during the time you plan to stay. So this will require quite a bit of savings.

Then there is the matter of learning the local language. Sure English is widely spoken, but a good deal of daily life is conducted in a local language e.g. Polish, Maltese, various dialects in the Philippines. This can complicate the employment situation, as well as the non-work activities.
 
I live in Ireland, but to be honest, our economy is flat and as other posters have said, we can no longer really be called a Catholic country, Our new government is currently dismantling what is left of the Catholic Church’s influence in Ireland, at an alarming pace, and also Catholics that are actually bothered about their faith are now in the minority. I’d love to pain an idyllic picture, apparently we used to be the land of saints and scholars - sorry, the reality is we are now struggling to get by and the Church here is being battered by the ongoing abuse scandals and atheist government agenda.
 
If only Ireland could be described as catholic.😊 i think those days have passed
 
I guess the people responding in this forum are right.

So sad that there’s no stronghold for the Catholic faith anymore. Everywhere is a battlefield against secularism now, I suppose…?
 
God calls us to be the light and salt wherever we live. We’re not supposed to escape “the world” but to help to transform it. So, if you do move to one of those countries be prepared to share and live out your faith just like you would if you stayed where you are. God be with you!
 
Some think Portugal is the place to go, in light of a remark made by the apparition at Fatima. Nevertheless you may be better off in a US diocese with a bishop of a certain reputation. You have Bruskewitz in Lincoln NE, Chaput recently moved from Denver to Philly, Arlington VA is suffering a vocations crisis of the other kind. But then again, bishops get moved around.

If it’s anti-Catholic bigotry you’re fleeing, you might want to look into Antarctica, or maybe the Moon.
 
Sorry to say but as with many other poster’s i live here in Ireland and Catholicism is pretty much non existent. No Catholic value’s are taken seriously by the Irish people anymore, we are as secular as Britain and America
 
I, also, have fantasies of being in a Catholic land…Ireland WAS so wonderful in the past. Unfortunately, I see that what three saints have said of Ireland, may come to pass. Total inundation by the sea. What a fitting thing for any country who shakes off the yoke of Christ.
 
Mairin said:
I, also, have fantasies of being in a Catholic land…Ireland WAS so wonderful in the past. Unfortunately, I see that what three saints have said of Ireland, may come to pass. Total inundation by the sea. What a fitting thing for any country who shakes off the yoke of Christ.
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Eek! I don’t particularly want to be inundated here, I’m still trying my best to follow Christ! What three saints, and what did they say? Should I be worried?
 
EphelDuath said:
I guess the people responding in this forum are right.

So sad that there’s no stronghold for the Catholic faith anymore. Everywhere is a battlefield against secularism now, I suppose…?
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Malta is extremely Catholic
 
I live in England, but have a strong large family in Ireland. Sadly Ireland is no longer Catholic. The UK as a whole has fallen 😦
 
EphelDuath said:
My fiancee and I have always wanted to live in Poland or Ireland or Malta or the Philippines, some place where Catholicism is taken very seriously as part of the culture and you’re unlikely to face bigotry for your beliefs from the mainstream culture.

The problem is, we’re not financially well off. She has a high school degree and is going to a community college/trade school next year. I have a degree in Theology & Religious Studies and have a decent job right now because of it, but it’s very doubtful I’d get anything remotely as good as that anywhere else I could go, considering I was very blessed to have gotten this job (over 60 people applied for it).

Any personal testimonies on people moving to foreign countries with minuscule finances?
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The world is not nuts about the Church, no matter where you go. This may be especially true in some of the places of “the world” with more than their share of nominal or disillusioned Catholics. I think you will find what you’re looking for by finding a place where the local churches have close-knit communities.

You may want to stick with the job you’ve been blessed with until the situation turns. Your blooms may be needed right where you’ve been planted!
 
Paddy1989 said:
Awrite it’s just when you said Ireland is no longer Catholic and then stated the UK as a whole has fallen i thought you were referring that it was, sorry 😊
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I was talking about the whole of Ireland and was not stating that the whole of it was in UK. But as I understand it Northern Ireland is still part of the UK 🙂
 
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