Archbishop of Tuam Dr Michael Neary has said people feel let down by events in international banking and commerce as well as by the
actions of the Church and governments.
Dr Neary was speaking ahead of today's annual pilgrimage at Croagh Patrick in Co Mayo. Thousands of pilgrims, many of them barefoot, were climbing the 2,500 ft peak for a service at the summit in an annual event known as "The Reek", staged on the last Sunday in July.
Over 20,000 people are climbing Croagh Patrick today.
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He told a congregation at Westport that the "old certainties" were disappearing.
In a reference to the involvement of a number of the clergy in sex-abuse allegations and courtroom proceedings, Dr Neary said the Church had been "shaken to its roots".
And he claimed that developments in the institutions of banking and high finance had created feelings of fear and insecurity.
"The old certainties are not there. We feel let down by governments - by what we thought was the stable world of banking and commerce," he said. "We feel that the Church has been shaken to its roots in the revelation of its human face of sin.
"Are we, a people gathered here, a people who have climbed a mountain path and have come to a crossroads to find that the signpost has been removed?
"We can no longer be honorary Christians, no longer sideline spectators as light grapples with darkness in a difficult age.
"The Church, which has suffered in recent years, perhaps more even than in the days of open persecution, is your Church.”