Sir, - I wish people would stop criticising the President for taking Communion in Christ Church Cathedral. I did not vote for Mrs McAleese, but I have been won over by her bridge-building efforts, not least by the aforesaid ecumenical gesture.
I write with a foot in both camps, so to speak. My mother was a Protestant, my father a Catholic; and I remember with sorrow our Catholic relations standing outside the church as a service for a departed Protestant relation took place within. I even had feelings of guilt myself, but Mother retained her freedom of conscience, thank God.
Fortunately that is all gone. Mother lived to see, with joy, the lesson being read at Mass, in English, by a woman; how she would have loved to have seen a Catholic President take Communion in Christ Church Cathedral.
I wonder what the founder of our way of life would say about this? Even a casual reading of the New Testament would suggest that He was hot on charity. It seems to me this is a virtue demonstrated by President McAleese, but sadly lacking in Prof. McEvoy. I hope we can now end this, and maybe learn from it. - Yours, etc.,
Malahide, Co Dublin.