The Catholic bishops hit out at Taoiseach Micheál Martin for not responding to a request to permit Mass for Easter almost four weeks after a meeting to discuss the vital issue.
In their strongest intervention on public worship, the Church leaders insisted last week that ongoing restrictions banning people attending Mass would be “unjust” as restrictions on other aspects of society would be eased. They say the “ongoing severe restrictions on attendance at funeral Masses (currently limited to ten) are causing untold grief to many families”.
They called for the limit of 10 people allowed at funerals be increased with “immediate effect”.
Meanwhile gatherings after funerals and at burials in cemeteries are a cause for “concern”, the bishop of Killaloe diocese said after a number of priests expressed “serious health and safety concerns” regarding the numbers in attendance.
Bishop Fintan Monahan said: “Whilst it is such a positive and deeply ingrained aspect of our culture in Ireland to gather and offer condolences to the bereaved family, unfortunately due to the highly contagious nature of the coronavirus it is still not safe to do so.”