Sir, - Kevin Myers (An Irishman's Diary, April 18th) tells his readers that "priests are bound to (sic) an oath of confidentiality". Completely wrong. They are not. The obligation to keep secret what is heard in confession does not arise from something as extrinsic as an oath.
Nor does it arise - as the word "confidentiality" used by Mr Myers might suggest - from the confidence reposed in the priest by the penitent. It is by virtue of the sacrament itself that priests are bound to absolute secrecy about any sin confessed to them in confession.
And from that obligation there is no dispensation. One can be dispensed from oaths and vows. No power on earth can dispense from the sacramental obligation.
Mr Myers goes on to speculate - an imprudent and impudent exercise in a matter of such moment - that "some of them" (priests) heard "things which might have prompted them to express a generalised concern to higher quarters". This is the drivel of a layman ignorant of the theology of the sacrament. And, as Mr Myers knows it would take more than a letter to unpack and show up for what it is the idiotic opinion he is expressing.
But there are depths beyond depths to his folly. He insinuates himself into the confessional, hears what is confessed and the pastoral responses and, with supreme arrogance and rashness, fantasises about a serial rapist of children - his "psychological balance" restored by a sympathetic father confessor - going on to rape his next victim "with a light heart".
This really is a travesty of the sacrament and of the facts. Inexcusable things have been done. Clear-headed realism is needed to deal with them. If Mr Myers cannot conduct his critique from the perspectives of the real world, he should take a rest until he recovers his psychological balance.
In every moral theology book of any merit there is a section on recidivists. And I can assure your readers that a priest would be bound in virtue of the dynamics of the sacraments, to refuse absolution to any penitent, lay or clerical, whom he recognised as failing to meet the subjective conditions required for absolution. Not to refuse when the conditions for refusal are fulfilled would be sacrilegious and make the confessor a participant in the guilt of the abuser. But my own speculation - better founded than Mr Myers's - is that serial abusers do not have regular confessors. - Yours, etc.,
M PHILIP SCOTT, OCSO,
Our Lady of Bethelehem
Abbey,
Portglenone,
Co Antrim.
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Sir, - I wonder if anyone could explain to me how canon law helps us to live our lives as Christians.
Would we be better off without it? - Yours, etc.,
CAITRIÓNA McCLEAN,
Weston Avenue,
Lucan,
Co Dublin.
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Sir, - In light of the Roman Catholic Hierarchy's managerial style and apparent priorities, I have only one question:
Martin Luther, where are you now that we need you? - Yours, etc.,
DERMOT O'SHEA,
Meadow Grove,
Dublin 16.