Madam, - D.K. Henderson (October 7th) demonstrates that the percentage of "practising" Catholics in Ireland is not the 96.6 per cent lauded by a spokesman for the Catholic Communications Office in Maynooth, but 65 per cent, given that 35 per cent do not fulfil their Sunday obligation to attend Mass.
I feel even this is an exaggeration. To be a "practising" Catholic one must do a lot more than put one's bum on a pew once a week. It entails believing and accepting all the teachings of the Church without exception. Once this criterion is examined, "practising" Catholics disappear like snowflakes.
Take, for instant, the teaching on contraception. Any poll among "practising" Catholics will show an 80 per cent-plus rejection of it by those whom it affects - and even by some clergy.
Let those who are left ask them if they accept the dogma of "no salvation outside the Catholic Church".
Why, even the Pope finds this dogma too unpopular to ask of the faithful. The hard fact is that "practising" Catholics are as rare as hens' teeth these days. Didn't the Lord tell us this when He asked: "When I return, will I find faith on Earth?" - Yours, etc.,
E.M. O'HANLON,
Braemor Road,
Churchtown,
Dublin 14.