Madam, – Róisín Ingle (Magazine, April 24th) again uses her column to have a good old rant at the Roman Catholic church.
As a practising Catholic, may I say that membership of the church is about belief in what the church teaches and promotes about Jesus Christ and has nothing to do with individual and organisational failures, deplorable as they may be. Human nature will always make itself manifest unfortunately, both inside and outside religious bodies of all origins and traditions. To assert otherwise is escapist and delusory. Ms Ingle seems to favour more esoteric faiths. Perhaps if she lived among these faith communities as a clear-eyed insider instead of an eager-to-be impressed visitor she might realise human failings are just as prevalent abroad as they are at home.
Ms Ingle is appalled at the church’s failure to protect children (and rightly so), yet also strongly opposed to the church’s teaching on abortion and divorce. Catholics believe that both divorce and abortion also damage and destroy children.
It is simplistic and misleading to exalt the value system of secularism over the teaching of the Christian churches. One might wonder how any secular code of conduct could emerge without a framework of religious belief somewhere in the background.
Irrespective of the declared positions of secular institutions on child abuse, such abuse is still happening across all sectors of society. It happens in homes and it happens to children in care. It happens on the watch of public bodies and Government agencies charged specifically with the protection of children. It happens for the same reasons it happened in the Catholic Church. It happens became some people will prey on the weak and vulnerable and other people are not committed enough or caring enough or brave enough to to the right thing when they suspect or should suspect wrongdoing.
Ms Ingle might as well take things to their logical conclusion and hand back her citizenship in protest at the corruption that is everywhere in this country. The fact is that there is nowhere anyone can go to avoid the human condition. The best option is to stay and oppose wrong and take steps to prevent it. – Yours, etc,