Sir, – To those who have called for a “Vatican Spring” to shake up and reform the Roman Catholic church – wake up! If you are basically happy with Catholicism but want a church that allows married and women priests, has a less authoritarian attitude and doesn’t bow and scrape to Rome on every issue, it would be easier to move to the Church of Ireland, or one of the many other more progressive “protestant” Christian faiths, than to change the nature of Roman Catholicism. After all, if you protest against the rules of the Roman Catholic faith you are already, by simple definition, a “protestant”. The Vatican spring should be a leap away. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – Following Patsy McGarry’s report (Home News, April 11th) regarding the swift action by the Vatican against Fr Tony Flannery and Fr Gerry Moloney; it is a pity the same people in Rome were not able to act so expeditiously against the abusing priest Fr Tony Walsh.
As a practising Catholic and sinner, of all the priests who have inspired me over the years, Fr Flannery and Fr Moloney are perhaps the most blessed with evangelising the gospel. What a grotesque message to send to Ireland on the cusp of the preparations for the Eucharistic Congress. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – I notice that the good Fr Tony Flannery has been silenced and advised by Rome to go to a monastery and “pray and reflect” on his situation (Home News, April 11th). This was the same “sentence” that was given to the notorious abuser of the young and founder of the Legionaries of Christ, Fr Marcial Maciel. Does the Vatican really think that treating them in the same way serves justice? – Yours, etc,
Sir, – As an aspiring Catholic with human difficulties for 79 years, I am sick up to the neck with the continuing condemnation and demonisation of the Pope, bishops priests nuns and laity by the national media.
Please would the media leave us alone and respect all other denominations as we do, and let us get on with our faith and beliefs. Just go and do whatever you think is right for you, and stop trying to justify your thoughts by condemning Catholics. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – John Ferry writes that the Vatican has a sacred duty to protect the faithful from taint of error (Letters, April 11th), but it has not made a very good job of it since the Church became polarised in 1054.
Teachings such as the Filioque, original sin, purgatory, limbo, the Immaculate Conception, clerical celibacy and others have been introduced piecemeal by various popes over the past few centuries although such teachings were not known during the first thousand years of the church, when there was only one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, and are still regarded as erroneous by the Eastern half of the church.
Such teachings have probably made it impossible for there ever to be a reconciliation between East and West, as the doctrinal differences are now too great. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – My God, my God, why have you forsaken us? This slight paraphrase of the last words from the Cross begins to express how low my spirits are when I behold the mess that is the Roman Catholic Church today.
In the past 50 years I have moved from blind obedient belief to tired acquiescence and now to a state verging on despair and the temptation to reject the Roman Catholic Church and all its works, popes and pomps, just as I rejected Satan at the Easter celebrations recently.
But I love the faith expressed in the Catholic community and, because I know that Jesus will never forsake us, I am filled with hope – a hope that the Spirit will save us from the mire of ordure in which we now struggle. A struggle in which many of us are not waving but dying.
I have a hope that some day an Irish bishop will realise that self-respect is next to godliness. I have a hope that he will speak to other bishops, not all but some, and that they will come to focus on the Christian imperative of self-respect and speak out fearlessly to Irish Catholics. I have a hope that by speaking out they will foster a renewal of self-respect in the people they serve.
The bishops will discern and make known which of the Vatican diktats conform to the essential teaching of Jesus Christ and will respond to the others in a manner befitting the self-respect of Irish Catholics.
If Hell hath no fury like a Vatican scorned then let that fury do its best. We will stand together,firm, resolute and truly Christian. Sursum Corda.– Yours, etc,