ACCORDING to a recent opinion poll, most Irish Catholics are Protestants in a profound identity crisis.
Despite 84% of respondents to Census 2011 identifying themselves as Roman Catholic, a survey published last week revealed that most Irish people don’t care about Papal teaching and its anachronistic morality.
A poll commissioned by the Association of Catholic Priests revealed Catholic Church teachings on sexuality have "no relevance" for 75% of Irish Catholics or for their families.
Furthermore, 87% believe priests should be allowed to marry, 77% believe there should be female priests and, in relation to the Church’s condemnation of homosexuality, 46% "disagree strongly" while only 5% "agree strongly".
Divorced people in a second relationship should be allowed to take communion, according to an overwhelming majority of respondents — 87%.
The Church in Ireland has received an urgent wake-up call but it remains to be seen if it is going to listen, or, instead, revert to type and shoot the messenger — messengers like Limerick cleric Fr Tony Flannery, who has been ‘locked up’ in a monastery since last week, far away from the media, for daring to publicly express disquiet about the Church’s authoritarian leadership.
While the Church desperately tries to censor dissent within its ranks, the excellent Would You Believe series, on RTÉ, recently featured a two-part episode on the future of the Church in Ireland that suggested the outlook is decidedly grim.
Dwindling numbers at Mass, an ageing clergy, and a lack of relevance were cited as huge stumbling blocks to the Church’s continued existence but, despite the gloomy prognosis, some priests were determined to reinvigorate their parishes.
Even this cynical atheist was moved by the contribution of Fr Seamus Ahern, a parish priest in Finglas who looks more like a folk musician, who baldly said "bishops and Rome are generally irrelevant … communion happens when there is a sense of humanity, God happens in ordinary life … change has to happen, let it happen — let the world of Church collapse".
Fr Ahern encourages his parishioners to debate among themselves and suggested that the old way of doing things, clutching rosary prayers and reciting prayers by rote, was "passive" and "robotic," saying "there was no connection [to God] — it wasn’t a divine presence because it wasn’t real".
The programme also featured a parish in west Dublin, Porterstown, in which female members say Mass every Wednesday morning.
According to Alice Crotty, one of the women who celebrate the weekly Mass, the ceremony was initially treated with suspicion by the local community, but has quickly built up a strong following and attendance is increasing each week.
"It will take some prophetic women with courage, and guided by the spirit, to bring about a new Church, if you want to call it Church," said another lay member, Mary Skelly.
These contributors said the Church was not about abstract doctrine preached by celibate men but, rather, about individual communities and their relationship with each other and with God.
The Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, who is often portrayed by the media as a modernising, trail-blazing progressive, had a traditional view and a somewhat surprising message for those people struggling with their faith — shape up or ship out.
"You can’t be a mature Catholic just on the basis of what you learned in primary or secondary school. It requires maturity … from those people who say ‘I don’t believe in God and I really shouldn’t be hanging on to the vestiges of faith when I don’t really believe in it’."
Martin was referring to so-called a-la-carte Catholics who think scared sacraments are rite-of-passage social occasions devoid of spiritual significance — like couples who are determined to marry in the local church, despite having no intention of again darkening its doors unless they have a baby to baptise.
Archbishop Martin also had a wake-up call for those people labouring under the misapprehension that being a good human being, coupled with a belief in God and regular prayer, makes one a Catholic. It doesn’t — there’s more to it than that, like turning up to Mass occasionally and, especially, listening to bishops.
"We do have a hierarchical Church — we can’t write-off the basic structures of the Church… a parish which drifts away from [its] bishop is drifting away from the Church. Our Church is a Church of communions, the bishop is a focal point of a communion in the diocese," Archbishop Martin said.
So, to be a good Catholic you must attend church regularly, listen to your bishop, agree with core dogma — divorce is immoral, homosexual acts are evil, and the sky would fall in if priests were allowed marry — and, generally, act like an automaton who doesn’t have the wit to read, or interpret, scripture.
Those who question the Church’s archaic and contradictory views — like, how can homosexuality be evil when ‘god created [all men] in his own image’ or how is it that married Anglican vicars who convert to the priesthood are capable of ministering in spite of their families? — are treated like errant children and told to shut up and stop asking questions.
EVEN elderly Catholic priests, who have given a life of service to the Church that they love, are treated just as harshly.
Marist priest Fr Seán Fagan has endured the torment of having his books bought up by his own order because Vatican authorities disliked the ideas expressed in them — an abhorrent practice reminiscent of the book burnings undertaken by the Nazi regime in the 1930s — and threats of excommunication if he dared to talk to anyone in the media about his treatment.
Despite their jackboot tactics, maybe Archbishop Martin and his employers in Rome have a point.
It’s been more than 500 years since Martin Luther challenged the authority of the Pope, when he sparked the Reformation by nailing an alternative doctrine on a church door in Germany in 1517, so those who long for a married clergy or a Church with more progressive teachings on sexuality have long had the option of choosing one of the many other varieties of Christianity.
The Catholic Church is a club and to join, or remain a member, you must hold core beliefs — even if those beliefs haven’t evolved in 2,000 years.
Fr Gerry O’ Hanlon, who has latterly been censored by the Vatican, told Would You Believe the Church in Ireland is facing a momentous choice — relevance or obliteration.
"Catholicism in Ireland will either go in one of two ways — become a much smaller, more traditional Church without great relevance to the wider society around it, or it will reinvent itself along the lines of gospel and Vatican Two, where lay people will become much more involved," he said.
Regrettably, for those who continue to value the Church in Ireland, the former path is likely to be chosen.
A poll commissioned by the Association of Catholic Priests revealed Catholic Church teachings on sexuality have "no relevance" for 75% of Irish Catholics or for their families.
Furthermore, 87% believe priests should be allowed to marry, 77% believe there should be female priests and, in relation to the Church’s condemnation of homosexuality, 46% "disagree strongly" while only 5% "agree strongly".
Divorced people in a second relationship should be allowed to take communion, according to an overwhelming majority of respondents — 87%.
The Church in Ireland has received an urgent wake-up call but it remains to be seen if it is going to listen, or, instead, revert to type and shoot the messenger — messengers like Limerick cleric Fr Tony Flannery, who has been ‘locked up’ in a monastery since last week, far away from the media, for daring to publicly express disquiet about the Church’s authoritarian leadership.
While the Church desperately tries to censor dissent within its ranks, the excellent Would You Believe series, on RTÉ, recently featured a two-part episode on the future of the Church in Ireland that suggested the outlook is decidedly grim.
Dwindling numbers at Mass, an ageing clergy, and a lack of relevance were cited as huge stumbling blocks to the Church’s continued existence but, despite the gloomy prognosis, some priests were determined to reinvigorate their parishes.
Even this cynical atheist was moved by the contribution of Fr Seamus Ahern, a parish priest in Finglas who looks more like a folk musician, who baldly said "bishops and Rome are generally irrelevant … communion happens when there is a sense of humanity, God happens in ordinary life … change has to happen, let it happen — let the world of Church collapse".
Fr Ahern encourages his parishioners to debate among themselves and suggested that the old way of doing things, clutching rosary prayers and reciting prayers by rote, was "passive" and "robotic," saying "there was no connection [to God] — it wasn’t a divine presence because it wasn’t real".
The programme also featured a parish in west Dublin, Porterstown, in which female members say Mass every Wednesday morning.
According to Alice Crotty, one of the women who celebrate the weekly Mass, the ceremony was initially treated with suspicion by the local community, but has quickly built up a strong following and attendance is increasing each week.
"It will take some prophetic women with courage, and guided by the spirit, to bring about a new Church, if you want to call it Church," said another lay member, Mary Skelly.
These contributors said the Church was not about abstract doctrine preached by celibate men but, rather, about individual communities and their relationship with each other and with God.
The Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, who is often portrayed by the media as a modernising, trail-blazing progressive, had a traditional view and a somewhat surprising message for those people struggling with their faith — shape up or ship out.
"You can’t be a mature Catholic just on the basis of what you learned in primary or secondary school. It requires maturity … from those people who say ‘I don’t believe in God and I really shouldn’t be hanging on to the vestiges of faith when I don’t really believe in it’."
Martin was referring to so-called a-la-carte Catholics who think scared sacraments are rite-of-passage social occasions devoid of spiritual significance — like couples who are determined to marry in the local church, despite having no intention of again darkening its doors unless they have a baby to baptise.
Archbishop Martin also had a wake-up call for those people labouring under the misapprehension that being a good human being, coupled with a belief in God and regular prayer, makes one a Catholic. It doesn’t — there’s more to it than that, like turning up to Mass occasionally and, especially, listening to bishops.
"We do have a hierarchical Church — we can’t write-off the basic structures of the Church… a parish which drifts away from [its] bishop is drifting away from the Church. Our Church is a Church of communions, the bishop is a focal point of a communion in the diocese," Archbishop Martin said.
So, to be a good Catholic you must attend church regularly, listen to your bishop, agree with core dogma — divorce is immoral, homosexual acts are evil, and the sky would fall in if priests were allowed marry — and, generally, act like an automaton who doesn’t have the wit to read, or interpret, scripture.
Those who question the Church’s archaic and contradictory views — like, how can homosexuality be evil when ‘god created [all men] in his own image’ or how is it that married Anglican vicars who convert to the priesthood are capable of ministering in spite of their families? — are treated like errant children and told to shut up and stop asking questions.
EVEN elderly Catholic priests, who have given a life of service to the Church that they love, are treated just as harshly.
Marist priest Fr Seán Fagan has endured the torment of having his books bought up by his own order because Vatican authorities disliked the ideas expressed in them — an abhorrent practice reminiscent of the book burnings undertaken by the Nazi regime in the 1930s — and threats of excommunication if he dared to talk to anyone in the media about his treatment.
Despite their jackboot tactics, maybe Archbishop Martin and his employers in Rome have a point.
It’s been more than 500 years since Martin Luther challenged the authority of the Pope, when he sparked the Reformation by nailing an alternative doctrine on a church door in Germany in 1517, so those who long for a married clergy or a Church with more progressive teachings on sexuality have long had the option of choosing one of the many other varieties of Christianity.
The Catholic Church is a club and to join, or remain a member, you must hold core beliefs — even if those beliefs haven’t evolved in 2,000 years.
Fr Gerry O’ Hanlon, who has latterly been censored by the Vatican, told Would You Believe the Church in Ireland is facing a momentous choice — relevance or obliteration.
"Catholicism in Ireland will either go in one of two ways — become a much smaller, more traditional Church without great relevance to the wider society around it, or it will reinvent itself along the lines of gospel and Vatican Two, where lay people will become much more involved," he said.
Regrettably, for those who continue to value the Church in Ireland, the former path is likely to be chosen.