Sir, In the Last Weekend Supplement of the Millennium, Patrick Comerford surmises that "The third millennium is likely to be the post-Christian millennium .. ." If there are two things that don't show up well on a crystal ball they are God's grace and man's correspondence to that grace. For this reason a forecast on the faith during a whole millennium is about as reliable as a long-term weather forecast covering an Irish summer.
Compare the attitude of Pope John Paul II to the new millennium: "The abundant tears of humanity during the 20th century open up the hope of a new spring . . . Mine is not a millenarist logic; I am convinced that the year 2000 will be an incomparable occasion to make the mystery of faith and the reflourishing of Christianity present in a society filled with anguish and asphyxia by secularism." - Yours, etc.,
Fr Gavan Jennings, Richmond Avenue South, Dartry, Dublin 6.