Dear Editor, Marie Collins’ recommendation that clerics who have misled Pope Francis around abuse and cover-up in Chile should be removed from office (IC 19/4/2018) makes perfect sense.
At this stage, it is hard to see how anything else could constitute a genuine commitment to the cause of zero tolerance in the field of child protection.
The Pope’s reference in his apology to what he called “a lack of truthful and balanced information” was particularly telling in this regard. Was he advised to disregard the letter Cardinal O’Malley gave him from Chilean survivors, and told it contained nothing truthful? Did somebody tell him that the people of Osorno were “dumb” and being “led by the nose” by “leftists”? What information led him to do and say such things, and who provided him with such information? It looks like heads should roll, even if red hats are perched on them.
On the other hand, one person who has come out of this affair looking as impressive as ever is Malta’s Archbishop Charles Scicluna. Every time he’s been called on to tackle issues of abuse and cover-up in the Church he has proven to be a model of clerical integrity, efficiency, and courage.
A red hat for the Church’s most effective combatant against abuse is surely overdue.
Yours etc.,
Gabriel Kelly,
Drogheda, Co. Louth.
It’s important to be well informed for Eighth vote
Dear Editor, Being a young Catholic working in psychology I have received my fair share of good debates and dialogue around the upcoming referendum on the Eighth Amendment. I believe both sides of this argument have at some point put forward false information regarding what they call “facts”. It is imperative that we in today’s society inform ourselves to make an educated informed opinion considering the ease of social media platforms to promote false propaganda as true.
An agnostic friend of mine sent me a post from Facebook entitled ‘Catholic teaching allows us to apply conscience to decisions on abortion’. The post from a group called ‘Catholics for choice’ argues that it is an individual’s conscience that rules supreme or our own perceived perception of reality versus what the Church/God teach.
What this means is that if I see it as “right” then it is no matter what anyone else teaches/says – very appealing to the individualistic framework of modern society that we currently live in.
I have seen my fair share of very well laid out arguments for abortion, but to use a platform masquerading as Catholic really takes the biscuit and only adds to the uncertainty of Christians seeking information regarding this very important referendum. Over in America the organisation has been denounced by various bishops and I hope anyone reading this will do further research into the organisation and make up your own opinions.
I believe the referendum in its essence has been complicated to extraordinary lengths; every conversation I have had revolving this debate eventually comes down to the individual belief of when life begins and the rights entitled to that life. The responsibility is on all of us to inform ourselves and get the correct factual information available.
Yours etc,
Patrick Fitzgerald,
Castletroy, Limerick.
Former President must decide
Dear Editor, Mary McAleese has not decided how she will vote in the forthcoming referendum.
In the 1983 referendum she was on the Pro-life committee with me in Navan. I would like to ask her today, what is the difference now? Is the baby in the womb any different in 2018 than it was in 1983? Is it not still a person?
The Church’s teaching has not changed.
Finally, what will Mary say when she meets God? She should know – she cannot blame others to make excuses for herself.
Yours etc.,
Jane McGurl,
Navan. Co. Meath.
Pope’s clarity so welcome in Gaudate et Exsultate
Dear Editor, Your decision to publish extensive highlights of Pope Francis’ exhortation on holiness, Gaudate et Exsultate (IC 12/4/2018) is to be applauded. I was fascinated by the four pages of extracts from the document, as well as by David Quinn’s and Austen Ivereigh’s commentaries, and searched out and read the document online in full.
One thing that struck me about it was how fresh it is – recent weeks have featured stories about how young Catholics at a conference in Rome doubted whether sainthood was achievable for all, or was a path to happiness, for example, but the Pope could hardly be more clear in saying not merely that both of these things are true, but how both these things are true.
I was taken too by how the Pope challenged those who cast doubt on different ways of serving God through others, or exalt certain causes as though other causes matter nothing compared to them.
As such, Francis calls us to fight against the evil of abortion, saying “our defence of the innocent unborn, for example, needs to be clear, firm and passionate, for at stake is the dignity of a human life, which is always sacred and demands love for each person, regardless of his or her stage of development”.
At the same time, he says, “the lives of the poor, those already born, the destitute, the abandoned and the underprivileged, the vulnerable infirm and elderly exposed to covert euthanasia, the victims of human trafficking, new forms of slavery, and every form of rejection” are no less valuable.
Catholics, the Pope reminds us, miss the mark if we do not care for all of our brothers and sisters, born and unborn.
Yours etc.,
Laurence Doyle,
Tallaght, Dublin 24.
What of the saints?
Dear Editor, I cannot be alone in thinking that a notable absence from catechesis and homilies in recent decades is reference to the lives of the saints. When I was growing up in the 1970s, stories and episodes from the lives of those the Church holds up as heroic in virtue were legion. Undoubtedly, some of these were hagiographical in nature and often exaggerated in the extreme.
Nevertheless, they were wonderful tales that inspired us as young people to want to aspire to be saints. Pope Francis in his recent exhortation Rejoice and be Glad devotes considerable time to talking about the role of the saints in the life of the Church. He points out that the saints are not held up as people to be emulated because they were perfect or even that everything they said was true or worthy of belief. The Pope reminds us that saints are people who are conscious of their sinfulness and their consequent need of God, but didn’t let this dishearten them. On the contrary, they embraced the Christian virtues so fully that the Church saw fit to raise them to the altars as people who could intercede for us before the throne of God.
In a world where we see so much that is wrong and so many people who are far from admirable, the saints would offer our younger people inspiring examples of people they would want to be like.
Yours etc.,
Mary Kelly,
Letterkenny, Co. Donegal.
Alternative to Al-Assad is worse
Dear Editor, In the rush to punish Syria’s Bashar Al-Assad for alleged attacks using chemical weapons, many commentators have ignored the voices of the Christian leaders in the region who are calling for peace. Christians in Syria certainly don’t want to see Mr Al-Assad – as awful as he is – overthrown because they know that the alternative will be much worse. While Mr Al-Assad and his Ba’ath party are secular in nature and leave the Christians to do their own thing, many of his opponents are Islamists determined to ensure that Syria becomes an Islamist state. It’s a sad fact of the so-called ‘Arab Spring’ that it has brought nothing but misery to the tiny Christian communities in countries that the West likes to describe as being ‘liberated’.
Yours etc.,
Des O’Donnell,
Dungannon, Co. Tyrone.
SVP has taken a position
Dear Editor, There is considerable disquiet amongst ordinary rank and file members of the Society of St Vincent de Paul that the leadership of the organisation has decided to take a neutral stance on the referendum on abortion. Of course, at one level one might say that the organisation is not taking a position – but the very fact of announcing that the organisation is not taking a position is, in fact, taking a position. People will read this accordingly.
Catholic social teaching calls us to be consistent on the fight for the vulnerable. This includes tackling homelessness, addiction, poverty and everything that is an assault on human dignity. There can surely be nothing more offensive to human dignity that the deliberate targeting of life at the most vulnerable stage – in the womb. This is a fight against what Pope Francis calls the ‘throwaway culture’ and the Society of St Vincent de Paul should be unashamedly on the side of the angels.
Yours etc.,
Siobhan McNamee,
Clontarf, Dublin 3.
