Madam, - On a Sunday evening recently I attended an Evensong Service in the very tiny, very beautiful Church of Ireland Church of St Brendan the Navigator, in Crookhaven, West Cork. I am a Roman Catholic and the friend I was with is Church of Ireland. The service was taken by a woman rector and the guest speaker was a woman rabbi who has a holiday home in West Cork.
The rabbi spoke about hospice care and the needs of the dying. The bidding prayers for the service were for children, all kinds of children, children with lots of material advantages and children with none, children with freedom and children with none, children who live in peace and children who live in war. It was very moving, very relevant and made a huge impression on me.
It also brought home to me once again how much the Catholic Church needs women priests and married priests, not least to articulate at services the deepest concerns of their congregations. - Yours, etc,
MÁIRE O'MAHONY, Bantry, Co Cork.