Dear Editor, Thank you for the excellent article by Fr Andrew McMahon on the Church and the media (IC 14/12/17). As Fr McMahon states, the media is generally hostile, sometimes very hostile, to the Church. In particular, the incessant pro-abortion propaganda in much of the media, most notably the Irish Times, which stands in contrast to the pro-life position of the Church.
What is equally repugnant to Christians is the sanitised, euphemistic, and sometimes Orwellian language used by pro-choice activists. When people talk about choice in this context, it is not a question of choosing from a dessert menu, but the choice of permitting the unborn baby to live or to kill it in the womb.
Of course, they make a point of never using the term ‘unborn baby’ lest one becomes aware that abortion entails the killing of a living entity. Further absurdities include the term ‘reproductive rights’.
Against this background, as Fr McMahon notes, it is not helpful for Church leaders to indulge media prejudices against the Church. While the number of committed Catholics is down, anyone involved in Church activities is aware of the strong commitment of a large number of Catholic to their Church. It will be some time yet before the secularists and humanists see the happy day for them of an irrelevant Church. In any event, those same people have nothing to offer in dealing with the big issues in life.
Yours etc.,
Tom O’Connell,
Howth, Co. Dublin.
Women’s health is everyone’s priority
Dear Editor, Mary Kenny’s article on women’s health (IC 14/12/17) included reference to Senator Ned O’Sullivan’s claim that he had changed his stance from being pro-life after serving on the Oireachtas Committee considering the Eighth Amendment.
I would like to point out that the senator voted in favour of the 2013 abortion legislation introduced by the Fine Gael-Labour coalition permitting abortion in cases of the threat of suicide.
As Mary Kenny pointed out, pro-life people should be as concerned for the health and welfare of women as anyone else, and indeed they are, offering every assistance to women with crisis pregnancies except abortion, and with no vested interest, as happens with those who gain from abortion provision.
Women deserve better than abortion and I cannot think of anything more insulting to a woman as to insinuate that she will not suffer after an abortion, as claimed by those promoting abortion, and who do women no service and are sadly lacking in assistance after an abortion. There is no such thing as an unwanted baby, someone will always be delighted to be given the chance to adopt, and, may I ask, why is there practically no promotion of this as a solution?
Why is there rightly much lauding of anyone who donates an organ to enhance another person’s life, but almost complete dismissal of allowing a baby the gift of life and adoptee parents the joy of raising a child.
How sad in the days of Christmas when we celebrate the birth of the most important and famous baby of all, Jesus, that our politicians are willing to deny the right to life to unborn babies. Hopefully, our people, if presented with a referendum, will vote to cherish and protect all life from conception until natural death, recognising that it is the most wonderful gift of all.
Yours etc.,
Mary Stewart,
Ardeskin,
Co. Donegal.
The Faithful remain
Dear Editor, Far from being a dying breed as described by the Archbishop of Dublin, today’s Irish churchgoers are more akin to the biblical hasidim and anawim – the loyal and faithful remnants, the lowly and poor (in spirit) who in the Old Testament continued to respond with fidelity to God the eternal father in very difficult times.
Despite repression and the powerful opposition of ‘peoples, nations, leaders and nobles’, the remnant remained loyal, faithful and inspirational.
The remnant of today will do the same. Despite the powerfully hostile forces that are arrayed against the Catholic Church and engaged in sustained onslaught, it is certain that just as in times past, today’s faithful anawim will remain loyal and poor in spirit and thus ensure that truth will triumph and Faith will never die.
Yours sincerely,
Con Lynch,
Macroom, Co. Cork.
A respectful and reasonable debate?
Dear Editor, Mr Charlie Flanagan TD, Minister for Justice and Equality, speaking in favour of introducing abortion into Ireland, is quoted as saying that he wants “respectful, calm and reasoned debate” on the issue.
The difficulty I have with this advice (which echoes secular newspaper editorials) is that an impression is created that abortion – the deliberate destruction of unborn human life – is not a matter of profound importance, but rather a run-of-the-mill subject, that can be discussed with equanimity.
Also, Mr Flanagan appears to be forgetting that he is supposed to be promoting ‘equality’ as part of his ministerial brief – the unborn too possess humanity.
The legal introduction of abortion in Britain in the 1960s has given rise to the destruction of some nine million unborn humans; in the US the abortion figure is around 50 million; surely the folly of this unimaginable massive destruction of unborn humanity (in the UK and US) provides a stark lesson for Ireland which should make even the suggestion of introducing abortion unthinkable.
Yours etc.,
Micheal O’Cathail,
Dun Laoghaire, Co. Dublin.
The challenge of the covenant
Dear Editor, The Irish Catholic (IC 14/12/17) presented the pessimists with a challenge. Now this may seem cynical, but one of the advantages of having fewer parishioners at Mass these days, is that more priests may be tempted to take Christ’s words literally when, at the Last Supper, he offered the chalice to the disciples and said: “Take this, all of you, and drink from it…” One of the reasons that most priests do not offer the Sacred Blood is that they are unaware that they are celebrating a covenant renewal ceremony, and that it is Christ’s Blood that seals this covenant. The aim of every covenant is to establish a relationship between the two parties.
The animal that was sacrificed and eaten during the covenant supper plays an important part. In ancient times its blood was spattered over the two parties as a way of sealing the covenant. This symbolic action showed that the two parties were now united almost like blood relations. In our case, Jesus asked us all to drink the Blood of the new and eternal covenant.
Many priests react to this, by saying that when we receive the Host we receive the living Christ – body, blood, soul and divinity. But it is the resurrected Christ, not the historical Christ of skin and bones who is present in the breaking of bread and who gives himself to us in Holy Communion? This is a spiritual action made real for us in the symbols used (the bread and wine). Not to offer the chalice omits one of the symbols that underlines the reality of our sealing the covenant in Christ’s blood – the covenant that makes us God’s children.
Yours etc.,
Fr Pat Seaver,
Farranshone,
Co. Limerick.
Scandal of the Committee on the Eighth Amendment
Dear Editor, It is scandalous, that the Irish Family Planning Association (IFPA) was invited to address the Oireachtas Committee on the Eighth Amendment, together with other organisations whose only expertise is that of campaigning for abortion, while at the same time organisations which actually empower women to progress through unexpected pregnancies were excluded.
Only a few years ago this HSE-funded organisation was found by undercover reporters to be advising clients on how to illegally import and take abortion pills.
It is also noteworthy that in the US, Planned Parenthood, the sister organisation of the IFPA, was found by undercover reporters to be illegally harvesting and selling body-parts of aborted babies.
That the Oireachtas Committee on the Eighth Amendment chose to be so partisan in its choice of speakers, leads one to conclude that the whole process was one drawn out media event designed to pave the way for abortion.
Yours etc.,
Gearóid Duffy,
Lee Road,