There is a culture of blame and condemnation in Irish society. It is coupled with an absence of that forgiveness which is spoken aloud almost daily by hundreds of thousands of Irish Christians in what is known as the Lord's Prayer: "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us." There is also an impulse to brand those who trespass as being without merit or worth, writes Vincent Browne
This has emerged again in the renewed fury over the hypocrisy of Fr Michael Cleary, a priest who gave sermons on sexual abstinence but who did not abstain.
In the furore, no allowance is made for any other qualities he may have had of loyalty, humour, kindness or compassion.
I did not know Michael Cleary personally, although I met him a few times, and there was a part of him I did not like or respect. That was his impulse to grossly distort the arguments of opponents on abortion, contraception and other issues of sexual morality. I thought there was a dishonesty and malevolence about that, but did not think him evil on that account.
The indignation over his hypocrisy is suspicious. Are we not all hypocrites to some degree? Don't we all, to some degree, fall short of our own ideal of ourselves, in our personal life, in our professional life, in our public life (and, yes, we all have a public life)? Many of us who profess to believe in egalitarianism are rich and we give to charities. Isn't there a hypocrisy there? Why would we give to charities if we thought doing so made no difference?
Given that we think it makes a difference, why do we not give all we own to charities or at least to the poor, aside from the necessities for existence for ourselves and those who depend on us? Many people in this society call themselves "Christian", by which I assume they mean they believe in the teachings of Jesus Christ. But many of these same people certainly do not love their neighbour as themselves or at all. Travellers are neighbours. How many of us love Travellers? How many of us love Nigerians? And aren't those who stint in their love for Travellers or Nigerians or whoever, while professing to be Christian, not hypocrites too? At least Michael Clearly did no harm, as far as I am aware.
Those of us who withhold love for Travellers and Nigerians very often do harm. Who is the worse? It is barely tolerable nowadays to say anything complimentary about Charlie Haughey. He is regularly described in the media simply as "the disgraced former taoiseach", as though those things that brought disgrace to him were all there was about him. No acknowledgment of the good he did, of the fine qualities he had of generosity, wit, intelligence, loyalty. Yes, he compromised on some of these qualities too, but do we all not compromise on the good side of us? Similarly, Ray Burke, "the disgraced former minister for justice". Did Ray Burke never do any good in his life, even in his ministerial life? I recall how he intervened to stop the export credit insurance debacle in 1989 when he became minister for industry and commerce. In many respects he was a good minister for justice.
Remember Fr Brendan Smith, on whose account the government of Albert Reynolds fell in 1994 and on whose account Bertie Ahern failed to become taoiseach in December 1994 just, incidentally, at the time when he was getting those interesting sums of money. Fr Brendan Smith is known now not just for that but as "the paedophile priest, Fr Brendan Smith". Isn't there something base and cruel about that depiction? Of course he was a paedophile and I am sure he caused terrible harm to many people. But is it believable that that was all there was to him? He may have been kind to his nieces and nephews and others, loyal to colleagues, clever, funny, generous (I don't know, for I know nothing about him, but it is not believable that he had no good qualities).
Fortunately, there does seem to be some forgiveness for Bishop Eamon Casey. His indiscretion (actually that is an inadequate characterisation of what he did because of his neglect of Annie Murphy and their child) seems not too significant nowadays. He did not sexually abuse any young people, nor is there any evidence that I know of that he covered up sexual abuse by anyone else, as many other bishops did.
Indeed there is evidence that he did the opposite. He certainly has many fine qualities of humour, generosity and, I am sure, loyalty.
If in the next week or so Bertie Ahern is shown to have compromised himself financially while he was minister for finance in the early 1990s, that won't go anywhere near characterising the man. Even if the worst transpires at the tribunal (and, incidentally, I doubt that the worst will transpire) he should still be recognised as a person of exceptional talents and qualities of intelligence, calculation, gregariousness, modesty, discipline, loyalty and generosity.
For, in the words of the familiar prayers, we are all sinners, even if not poor, banished children of Eve, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears.