A leading Churchman has called on Irish Catholics to stand up for their faith and be counted. Cardinal George Pell, Australia's most senior prelate, who has just completed a week-long visit to Ireland, also told The Irish Catholic that Church leaders should stop courting the secular media and concentrate on recruiting new members.
Sometimes ''bishops and Church leaders look over their shoulders too much to see what the opinion writers in the secular press have to say, it's one thing to have a vote of sympathy from the editorial writers in the secular papers, but they're not joiners, what we want is people who'll join the Church, that's who we bishops need to reach out to, not court sympathetic editorials in the secular newspapers,'' he said.
In an exclusive interview with The Irish Catholic, Cardinal Pell, Archbishop of Sydney, also said he sometimes gets frustrated with the Church's inadequate response to the needs of the modern world: ''What I think is most disheartening is when things are going badly for the Church, but you also know that the Church is not responding adequately to the challenge - in fact, by its responses its making the situation worse, that's very disheartening.
Catechetical programme
''What I find heartening is that if you put the fundamentals in to place correctly, you get a decent catechetical programme, you teach the fullness of the faith and morals, then people buy in to it.
''Whatever our problem, the problem is not within the genuine Catholic tradition, it may be we live it inadequately, or imperfectly, or it's obscured by scandals, but, if you allow the genuine Catholic tradition to be presented and people live it, it works, even with all the hostile pressures of our society,'' he says. Responding to an aggressive secularist thrust in society, Dr Pell urged Catholics to ''stand up and be counted,'' and refuse to allow people to ''kick the Faith around''.
Religious Education
Cardinal Pell also criticised a lack of proper religious education for young people insisting that if the Faith is not passed on properly ''we're cutting our own throat''.
''Some people were tempted to think that if we downplayed the harder Christian teachings, Christ's message would be more accessible.
''In fact, it doesn't work like that: we believe Christ's message has supernatural origins and time has shown that it is effective and it is most effective when it is presented to young people in its fullness,'' he said.
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