Murphy Report: the reason why?

When did we Irish Catholic clergy stop listening to the laity?   It was sometime between the death of Queen Victoria and the founding of the Irish Free State, between 1901 and 1922: there were plenty of us priests;  we were treated with extraordinary deference;  we were the sole moral arbiters of our society; we were trusted without limit.

We didn’t think that the laity had anything to tell us, not even after Vatican II encouraged us to listen to them.   The idea of the simple faithful remained: the late Cardinal Conway even worried about “the mentality of the people”, who, obviously, had nothing to teach us.

Why, then, could we have listened, really listened, when somebody came to tell us that one of our own was abusing children?  Individually, we were often humble, but we were caught in an institutional arrogance so great that defense of the institution itself was far more important than the sufferings of damaged people.  The people’s ancient trust of their priests was betrayed.  Jesus’ own words about children (Mark chapter 10, verses 13 to 16) were ignored.

There is no excuse for us getting it so consistently wrong for so long.

“2009 A.D. : Abuse and Idolatry”

The words above could, without the date, be the title of a thousand anti-Catholic pamphlets written since the Reformation, but it is, in fact, the title of the two-page summary of this year’s religious events in Ireland as given by Phoenix Magazine in its 2009 Annual.   The report emphasises the abuse revelations and the wait for apparitions at Knock.   One of the illustrations is a bad photograph of the Pope.

Phoenix never takes prisoners and never hesitates to take a stand.  For example: it is probably the only Irish journal to criticise Colm Toibin, suggesting that his reputation is inflated and that he overwrites.

When it reports on religion, Phoenix is overcome by standard anti-clericalism and gets it wrong.  Irish Catholicism is not all about clergy and apparitions.  Its strength comes from the daily acts of devotion, generosity and kindness that characterise the lives of very many, very ordinary, Irish people. We need that strength this month: beset by floods, deeply disillusioned by our leaders in State and Church and seeing no way out of our economic woes.

Murphy Report: the first leaks

Liam Collin’s  articles in today’s Sunday Independent gain from being so calm.  He gives the details of  sexual abuse by priests in the diocese, but doesn’t make the mistake of getting onto any moral high ground.  He tells us that everything we have feared is going to be confirmed when the Report on Dublin Diocese is published later this week and gives just enough detail to make us thoroughly disturbed. (Not all of his five articles are available online, but the substance is given in the Irish Independent)

Archbishop Diarmuid Martin has prepared both clergy and public for what we are going to hear.  This is a major  break with the old tradition of secrecy, which played a major part in getting us into this mess.

Our bishops, however, seem to have an air of  “business as usual”.  This makes them look  exactly like our bankers!  They must realise that everything has changed and that diocesan and national synods in Ireland are decades overdue.  We must be assured that secrecy, particularly in the appointment of bishops, has been abandoned and that Irish Catholicism is moving into a new  era of openness and collaboration, even if it is about thirty years too late.

John Waters on John Bruton

I didn’t spot John Waters in the large crowd who listened to John Brut0n giving the Studies/Iona Institute Lecture at the Alexander Hotel last Monday, but his column in today’s Irish Times is a  good reflection on what was said.

John Bruton gave excellent responses to questions and urged us to get involved in European politics, rather than grumbling about it:  if you’re angry about something,  make sure that you and your friends write to your MEP;  remember that the People’s Party (the Christian Democrats and their friends) is the largest party in the European Parliament;  don’t worry about ultra-liberal resolutions passed by the European Parliament – they make  secular-minded MEPs feel good about themselves, but  have no binding force.

John Bruton is a great loss to Irish politics, because he’s a man in the tradition of John Redmond, a politician to whom principles are more important then crowd-pleasing.  The text of the lecture will be published in Studies in our Spring 2010 issue.

An Epitaph for Irish Catholicism?

It was gobsmacking, last year, when Eamon Maher talked up a truly awful book about Irish Catholicism (Empty Pulpits by Malachi O’Doherty) and recommended to to every reader of the Irish Catholic newspaper.

It’s merely puzzling that Eamon didn’t  really use a column, in yesterday’s Irish Times, to talk up the book he has just co-edited with Father John Littleton.  His column seems to focus on negative stereotypes:  dissatisfaction, anger or nostalgia. There seems to be an endorsement for the “whatever you’re having yourself ” approach to Catholic teaching.

In fact, the twenty-two articles in What being Catholic means to Me are diverse and fascinating; they tend to accentuate the positive.  All of the men and women who contribute sound like they’d be very good company.  The only criticism is their age profile:  all the writers seem to be middle-aged or more.

The word “epitaph” creeps into Eamon Maher’s column,  but it’s not justified.  Irish Catholicism, part of a great worldwide Church, is nowhere near the tomb.  Following Eamon’s example in The Irish Catholic (but for a far better book), this blog recommends What being Catholic means to Me to every reader.

John Bruton on Religion in European Union

John  Bruton is giving the Studies and Iona Institute Lecture tonight.  It’s in the Alexander Hotel,  near Merrion Square.  He’ll be talking about Religion in the European Union.

When he was Taoiseach, John Bruton broadened our view of the Irish past: on his office wall there was a large portrait of  John Redmond, who had been expelled from the pantheon of Irish patriots.   John Bruton attended a ceremony at the War Memorial at Islandbridge.   He was clear in his acceptance of the different strands in the life of the whole island of Ireland.

For five years, John Bruton was been the EU Ambassador in Washington, DC and intends to become active in European politics once more.   He’s a committed Catholic,  so he doesn’t win the applause of those who regard the European Union as fundamentally godless.   He won’t be afraid of them, because he knows his brief much better than they do.

Can Irish politicians talk?

We Irish are said to have the gift of the gab, but is this, like the Celtic Tiger, more shadow than substance?  Let’s look at a few of our prominent people:  Joan Burton and Richard Bruton have more in common than being the Finance Spokespersons for their parties and having somewhat similar names; both of them actually talk to the camera and to other people.  In other words, they sound natural.  It’s a gift shared, alas, by only a few prominent politicians.

Brian Cowen, our Taoiseach, doesn’t talk, he growls. Being an hereditary politician, he never had to learn basic communication skills.

Enda Kenny, leader of Fine Gael doesn’t talk, he orates. Spontaneity seems to be beyond him.  There must be a real person in there, somewhere…

Eamon Gilmore, leader of Labour doesn’t talk, he fulminates, but that’s the house style for his party and he shouldn’t be blamed for it.

John Gormley and Eamon Ryan, both Green Party ministers, think that to wince  is to communicate.  They work so hard to convince us of their sincerity that we wish they had paid for better media training, so their effort would, at least, be less obvious.

This problem extends beyond politics: Miriam O’Callaghan, RTE’s most glamorous broadcaster, doesn’t interview, she interrupts.  Miriam needs to be convinced that other people are at least as interesting as herself. This would make her a good rather than just a glamorous broadcaster.  We all know that she’s got it in her!

Still worse is the case of Emer O’Kelly, columnist and atheist pundit: she doesn’t talk, she narks. In person, she’s charming, but she writes some of the most rebarbative pieces in Irish journalism.  Somebody should take her to a quiet corner,  sit her down, give her a very nice cup of tea and tell her to stop worrying, because the future is in God’s hands and He is good.

So, have modern stresses  reduced our verbal talents?  Or have our leaders and opinion formers taken their  media coaching far too seriously?

The Real Face of Irish Labour?

Kevin Myers is no longer an opinion former.  When he moved from the Irish Times to the Irish Independent (which, in fact,  sells far more copies),  our chattering classes forgot all about him.  His recent analysis of the unrepentant and narrow Marxist background of many of our current Labour leaders will be ignored.   It’s startling and it’s alarming, not least in its account of the “disappearance” of a file on the Workers Party from the Irish Times archives.

Labour may be a minority in a future coalition with  Fine Gael, but it’s well able to wield an influence far beyond its actual numbers, just as the few Progressive Democrats turned their many Fianna Fail colleagues from being pragmatic politicians into mindless worshippers of  wealth.  Labour’s leaders act like street fighters, whereas Fine Gael prides itself on being genteel, so, in coalition with Labour, it won’t stand a chance.

There’s an international aspect to Labour’s secularist mindset, a mindset that the (often maligned) Greek Orthodox Church has identified on the other side of Europe.   Do we really want the characterless,  but politically correct  Europe we are being offered by self-styled and self-regarding radicals?

Rushing to Explain and Excuse Murder

Some of the comments about the recent shooting in Foot Hood, Texas,  are remarkably like those made whenever there’s a murder in Ireland, or elsewhere: the killer must be unwell, cannot have been himself/herself, etc. The victims are overlooked,  as we indulge in public agonizing about the mindset of the perpetrator:  “How will the shooter feel when he wakes up?”

David Brooks confronts this attitude head-on in today’s New York Times.  About one-third of his article, on “Rushing to Therapy”, applies only to contemporary America, but most of it could be written about Western culture in general, and Ireland in particular, including his conclusion that the reaction to the killing “denied, before the evidence was in, the possibility of evil. It sought to reduce a heinous act to social maladjustment. It wasn’t the reaction of a morally or politically serious nation“.

On not listening to the Irish Laity

Eamon Casey’s relationship with Annie Murphy was his biggest mistake during his time as Bishop of Kerry.   This was so scandalous that it completely overshadows another error: the destruction of the interior of  St.Mary’s Cathedral in Killarney.  The layman who planned the renovation(and who ruined church interiors the length and breadth of Ireland) is dead, but Killarney Cathedral remains as one of the worst examples of his work.

Ireland’s strict new planning laws and local protests recently prevented a similar catastrophe in Cobh Cathedral. This  leaves one question: does anybody really seek the opinion of  worshippers? Or, more broadly, how many church leaders really listen?

Breda O’Brien gives an outstanding reflection on current happenings at Knock Shrine and analyses some of the fundamental weaknesses of Irish Catholicism.  A lot of people want warmth and involvement;  they want to be given something to do, rather than turn up and just sit there (which is the Irish tradition in worship).   Breda is correct when she says, as Pentecostals already know, that a lot of people go where the action is.