It’s not for politicians to try and tell the Church what to teach

Senator Catherine Noone is the Fine Gael politician who chaired the Oireachtas committee on abortion. She has been described in the Irish Independent as having a “colourful career”. As well as her advocacy for abortion, Ms Noone has taken up causes as diverse as the regulation of ice cream vans and expressed her disappointment that ministers are no longer provided with taxpayer-funded top-of-the-range cars.

Ms Noone also provoked controversy after she wrote to the GAA to complain that she had not been allocated tickets for the All-Ireland football final.

The Mayo-born representative took to the social media site Twitter on Easter Sunday to complain about a Mass she had attended: “Easter Mass in Knock Basilica this afternoon with my parents – an octogenarian priest took at least three opportunities to preach to us about abortion.” Ms Noone then added her belief that “it’s no wonder people feel disillusioned with the Catholic Church”.

It wasn’t clear from the message – deleted sometime later – whether the senator objected to the fact that the cleric was in his 80s or the fact that he was articulating the Catholic teaching on the sanctity of human life.

Sneering

Quite apart from what appears to be sneering at the priest’s age, Ms Noone’s comments reveal a staggering arrogance. The Church’s teaching that abortion is wrong is well-known. What exactly was she expecting at Mass – an endorsement of her deeply-flawed report recommending abortion without restriction for unborn children up to 12 weeks?

Ms Noone may be “disillusioned” that the Church won’t fall into line and remain silent on the issue of abortion, but she has no right whatsoever to try to influence what a Catholic priest can teach in a Catholic Church.

Her comments will undoubtedly annoy many priests and Catholics in the pews who will see it as an unwarranted interference from a politician.

We’ve become used to Irish politicians unfairly objecting to the Church issuing statements about things they disagree with. Curiously, the same politicians will often welcome a statement from the Church if it chimes with their own views.

Senator Noone’s intervention goes even farther: she appears to see it as her role to object to a Catholic priest teaching Catholics the Catholic faith in a Catholic church. Speaking to priests, the response seems to be that more and more of them are going to use the Sunday homily in the run-up to the referendum to remind parishioners why Catholics believe that all human life is sacred.