‘Many youth’ attracted to Church teaching rather than ‘angry’ politics

Bishop Donal McKeown has likened Brexit to radical nationalist movements in Germany, France and the US under Donald Trump’s administration, saying the Church’s message is more appealing to “many young people”.

The Church’s message focuses “very strongly on the whole idea of reconciliation and healing, it certainly has a huge contribution to make,” he told The Irish Catholic in Rome.

He said there are many young people who want to be involved in something constructive rather than “just be angry at immigration” or other issues stemming from fragmentary politics.

Bishop Donal is currently attending the Synod of Bishops on ‘Young People, the Faith and Vocational Discernment’ which runs from October 3-28 and has discussed issues relating to populism and radicalism in societies around the world.

Fragmentation

“So fragmentation is currently the ‘in thing’ and people will use it to A: express anger, very often in a destructive way and B: to get themselves to the top of the tree where they can proclaim their message, with recognition that politics can be very good at instrumentalising popular dissatisfaction, and actually encouraging it, rather than assuaging it,” he said.

Dr McKeown said that this anger rarely leads to positive change, but there’s an opportunity for the Church to be a prophetic voice in calling for forgiveness and healing.