Madam, - Fr Seán Fagan (January 29th) keeps fighting the Humanae Vitae battle that he and other theologians fought, with freedom of conscience and without being relieved of their priestly duties, in the 1960s.
He doesn't accept that, for those of us Catholics who set the views of our Pope above all other views, the opinions of priests and laity, male and female, deemed to be theologians are, with all due respect, a dime a dozen by comparison.
These exchanges began as a discussion of the judgment implications of general conscientious dissent from the official - that is, Pope-sanctioned - teaching of the Catholic Church. As judgment is now relatively imminent for many of us who fought 1960s battles, two interesting and rather urgent issues now arise.
One is: will the fact that they heeded the dissenting views of people such as Fr Fagan be a major mitigating factor for those who sinned because they dissented from the Humanae Vitae verdict?
The other is: what mitigation will be relevant for Catholic priests, in particular, who sinned because they so dissented - even though rightly or wrongly, it is generally presumed that their remit is to present, explain and defend official Church teaching.
Some may deem my use of the word "sinned" in this context to be insensitive. However, the Fr Vincent Twomey Word article that started these exchanges was specifically about the sinful implications of dissent. - Yours, etc,
JOSEPH F. FOYLE, Ranelagh, Dublin 6.