Small changes to missal without resources required
Dear Editor,
I read with interest your lead article (IC 14/09/2017) which indicated that, although permission had been given to change, we will stick with the current missal, largely for resource/cost reasons
Could I appeal to the Irish bishops to make a number of small changes back to the previous translation – these could be easily organised via Errata slips to be inserted into existing missals, and would easily be incorporated into weekly missalettes.
1. Please, please, le bhur dtoil, give us back the two beautiful Advent Prefaces. (“The virgin mother bore him in her womb with love beyond all telling”, “Now we watch for the day, hoping that the Salvation promised us will be ours”). The lovely poetry and the clarity of the former translations is lost in the clunky new translation.
2. Change the Prayer for the Dead back to “Welcome into your kingdom etc.” The current “give kind admittance into your kingdom” suggests that you need a PayPal account, and the sentence construction is medieval Latin and hard to understand.
3. Remove “consubstantial” from the Creed – the word is archaic, prescientific and a stumbling block to younger people.
I believe that these three simple changes could be easily implemented with no resources required, and would help to restore the balance disturbed by the new very literal translation.
Yours etc.,
Martin Clynes,
Clontarf,
Dublin 3.
***
Some thoughts on prayers and bad theology
Dear Editor,
I read Fr Joe McVeigh’s letter and responses to it (IC 07/09/2017). I read Fr Joe’s letter again and went through it to see exactly what his theological objections were to the Rosary decade prayer. There I found it, not exactly as your other contributors interpreted it. Save us from the fires of Hell, is of course theologically unsound. We save ourselves from the fires of Hell. No soul stumbles into Hell unawares, they choose to go there. I’m sure Fr Joe has no problem with the prayer to St Michael the Archangel, and when it says in it where Satan should be cast, and all the other wicked spirits.
The part in the decade prayer that I have more difficulty with is where it says, especially those most in need of thy mercy. I find the concept of mercy hard to comprehend. We have a
situation where one commits a crime, does not have sorrow, does not seek forgiveness, and appears not to deserve it, and then they are shown mercy. This must be the mercy that Pope Francis speaks about, when he says “who am I to judge”.
My granny used to say in her simple theology, when she was doing her knitting, the pattern is on the other side. As the Bishop of Limerick said in 1920, “ere I accuse I must have proof, a witness, place and time, ere I condemn I must be sure that there has been a crime. A little heavier on the forgiveness and mercy, and a little less on the condemnation.”
Yours etc.,
Donnchadh Mac Aodha,
Co. Leitrim.
***
Regarding the HPV vaccine
Dear Editor,
I am writing in response to article by Dr Kevin McCarroll regarding the HPV vaccine (IC 07/09/2017). He elucidates in his article that the HPV virus is contracted by sexual activity. I presume that if young teenage girls refrained from sexual activity then they would not contract the virus. Thus they would not need to take the vaccine. I may be naive in simplifying it like this but I am surprised that it is taken for granted that most if not all young teenage girls are or will engage in sexual activity.
Yours etc,.
John Kennedy,
Balbriggan, Co. Dublin.
***
The other side to mindfulness techniques
Dear Editor,
I refer to a recent article by Fiann O Nualláin entitled ‘Living up to your full potential, mindfulness is more than a stress management technique’ (IC 07/09/2017). It’s difficult to argue with points made by Mr O Nualláin – being in the present moment, being aware and observing the changes in the seasons. However, he does not refer to the breathing meditations that would be practiced and recommended for regular practice at mindfulness meetings. With Buddhist roots those practices are about ‘emptying’ as understood in that tradition and they can open up the subconscious. Not unusually, the article is entirely positive about mindfulness.
An article entitled ‘Has mindfulness lost its mind’, by psychiatrist Professor Patricia Casey in the Irish Independent, on January 17, 2017, paints a different picture. It relates to clinical research projects carried out in the UK where all psychologists caution against the simplistic and over exaggerated claims made by its proponents and by the media. The research showed up inconsistencies in relation to the effects of mindfulness, for example it being helpful in preventing relapses of depression for just some categories of people who already had three relapses but not for those with less, relief for stress being no better than what is gained from exercise or relaxation, and contrary to common belief studies of the impact on brain structure and coping skills reveal that a plateau is reached after a few weeks. Prof. Casey concluded that “enthusiasm should not outrun evidence and this is a real possibility where mindfulness is promoted as a panacea for all our unpleasant emotions”.
I agree with the view of one research coordinator that what he called the “powerful social phenomenon” is probably rooted in our culture’s desire for quick fixes and “its attraction to spiritual ideas divested of supernatural elements”.
Yours etc.,
Eileen Gaughan,
Strandhill, Sligo.
***
Why does society fear children with disability?
Dear Editor,
The greatest argument against abortion for what is wrongly termed ‘fatal foetal abnormality’ is given in the book Under the Eye of the Clock (1987) by Christopher Nolan.
Christopher Nolan, native of Clontarf, Dublin was severely disabled at birth with cerebral palsy. Yet through the care of his parents, especially his mother who used a typing stick attached to his head, he learned to type, being confined to a wheelchair and suffering from severe disability, every day. At the age of 15 years he won international fame and awards for his book of poems Dam-Burst of Dreams.
In his autobiography he wrote against abortion of disabled children, with the following: “Now they threatened to abort babies like him, to detect in advance their handicapped state, to burrow through the womb and label them for death, to baffle their mothers fear for their coming…why then does society fear the crippled child and why does it hail the able-bodied child over what may in time become a potential executioner?”.
Yours etc.,
Fr Con McGillicuddy,
Raheny, Dublin 5.
***
Growth of Orthodoxy due to beauty of liturgy
Dear Editor,
One aspect of the growth of Orthodoxy in Ireland (IC 07/09/2017) and indeed elsewhere, is the beauty of the liturgy, both in the rite and in the choral music; a mirroring of the Extraordinary Rite in the West. Is it any wonder that beauty and the rite of centuries are attractive, especially for the young, and makes a welcome change from priests dancing with bridal parties in the aisle, or a flash mob wanting to be the next five-minute sensation on YouTube! Thank God for the beauty of holiness!
Your etc.,
Fr John McCallion,
Coalisland, Co. Tyrone.
***
Christ’s spiritual electrons at work
Dear Editor,
This is a memory I have carried with me. Shortly after WWII, two nuns from Texas came to our school in Crossmolina, Co. Mayo. They did not seem to be looking for vocations.
One nun spoke. The other was silent. The first words were: “Do you know what electrons are?” I certainly did not. If any other pupil knew, they stayed silent.
“Electrons are the electrical impulses that are generated in the power house,” she explained. “They are carried along the wires that run from pole to pole, brining light and heat to your home. I have come to ask you to be spiritual electrons for us sisters, to help us in our work for souls.”
Many years later I found myself thinking of Calvary as the power house and the priests at Holy Mass as Christ’s electrons bringing his power and his victory over sin and death to us each day all over the world.
Yours etc.,
Annie T. Morris,
Foxford, Co. Mayo.