Madam, - I was dismayed by the sheer glibness of Fr Tony Flannery's defence of the institutional Catholic Church (Rite and Reason, August 7th). If he wishes to retract the apologies that have already been proffered to the abused, then let him do so. That would spare us from the cultural relativism he offers as an excuse.
After all that has been said on the subject it is still necessary to state the obvious: there should be no equivalence made between the manifest ills of a manic consumer society and the evil of the rape of a child.
Fr Flannery might inform his conscience with a modicum of imagination and consider the reality of those whose most tender years were filled with horror. There but for the grace of God. . . - Yours, etc,
GERRY CLAFFEY,
Aughavannagh Road,
Crumlin,
Dublin 12.