Sir, I would like, through your paper, to express my gratitude to Kevin Hegarty for his splendid article on the state of the Catholic Church in Ireland (January 1st and 2nd). He describes so well the institutional Church with its authoritarian and patriarchal attitudes, now cut off from reality and "drawing inspiration from outdated maps of the Irish mind".
For many years I have considered myself to be a loyal member of an "alternative" church in which bishops and other clerics were only respected if they showed signs of due humility and a desire to serve. This mind map of a "parallel church" has probably always existed I acquired it from my mother and she from hers.
As a lay student of theology (Milltown Adult Education Diploma, second year), I meet many people who fill me with hope for the Church which is to come, when the present structure has been destroyed by its own arrogance and the stables cleaned out. This future Church will, one hopes, resemble the one so beautifully described by Fr. Hegarty in his concluding paragraph. Yours, etc., M Sc, Ph D, Upper Kilmacud Road, Dundrum, Dublin 14.