Dear Editor, Peter Costello has written a fascinating article (Preserving the Catholic Library for another Century IC, 25/8/16) about the Central Catholic library. I have a long association with the library (indeed, I was one of the many UCD students who availed of the library’s treasures in the 1960s and 1970s).
Although I am not now in a position to visit the library as often as I would like to do I nevertheless regard it with great fondness – a homely and welcoming place that exudes orthodox Catholic teaching and thinking. This was Fr Brown’s intention.
I acknowledge that the years take their toll on the upkeep of a library such as the Central Catholic Library. This is inevitable when there is – thank God – no agenda-driven funding involved. However, I am very concerned that Mr Costello refers to a “quite providential” offer from an institution that he describes as being “one of our great seats of learning, the heirs to the famous seats of learning in Early Christian Ireland”.
According to seemingly general knowledge, the institution to which Mr Costello refers is Dublin City University (DCU) in Glasnevin – a self-styled ‘secular’ university. A ‘new home’ for the Central Catholic Library? DCU has recently announced a new Graduate Certificate in Sexuality and Sexual Health Education, and also a Graduate Certificate in Relationships and Sexuality Education for People with Intellectual Disability. These courses are to be run in partnership with the Irish Family Planning Association (IFPA) – an affiliate of the International Planned Parenthood Federation, which is the biggest provider and promoter of abortion in the world. The IPPF, too, is the organisation that was recently exposed for its scandalous business of the commercial sale of body parts of aborted babies.
If it is true that DCU is the institution then I think there is cause for alarm bells to be ringing loudly, and for many questions to be asked.
Yours etc.,
Lelia O’Flaherty,
Rathmines, Dublin 6.
