The 80 year old woman from Cork

Things are bad in Ireland when an 80 year old woman calls on all catholics to boycott Mass on the 26th September, as a protest against the Church re the Murphy report and the treatment of women. It's not the call to protest that's bad, but asking people to stay away from Mass, a day of obligation, where we are obliged to attend Mass and the amount of press coverage given to it that is quite mad. People have lost all sense of reason in this country. The Church, as a rule, has never had women priests in 2,000 years of history, so why use the scandals to promote the equality agenda which is politically motivated. Does this little old woman think for one minute that a woman priest would be less likely to cause scandal in the Church. She forgets it was a woman, Eve, who tempted her male companion, to sin. What was the sin? Disobedience. The evil one, the serpent, obviously knew he couldn't tempt the man, but he knew a woman could! So there we have it. The fall from grace began with a woman. But all was not lost. The restoration of grace came about through no less than a woman, who was totally obedient to God, and said a full 'yes' to His will for her in her life. This obedience brought into the world the Light of the world for our salvation.

When women stop trying to be men and be true women, they will have great peace and fulfillment in being women. I want to publish a letter I found in the Irish Times today on this subject. Says more than I can say:

Madam, – When I lived in Northern Ireland I helped the charity Parity to prosecute the then British government in the European Court of Human Rights for discrimination against men in the way the state pension was paid to women five years earlier than to men.

Although we won the case, 10 years on the change has still not yet been implemented and to this day men in Northern Ireland continue to be routinely discriminated against. When we won the right to equal access for men to free travel, the BBC covered the story by interviewing women only and presenting it as a backward step for women.

My complaint to it about unfairness was rejected on the grounds that “only women were affected by the change”. There were of course other aspects of discrimination against men which we overturned, in terms of gender-biased prescription charges, winter fuel payments, widowers’ benefit, etc, but the media has been strangely unwilling to publicise them.

There is continuing discrimination against men in this country: for instance virtually all workplace deaths involve men, as women continue to be under-represented in the most dangerous jobs, but every year the HSA fails to mention this in its report, and the media fails to make it an issue. There are many other examples.

Eithne Reid O’Doherty (August 12th) needs to understand that political representation is about recognising, respecting and delivering the needs of all your constituents, not just those of the her gender. Equality is for everyone, not just for women. – Yours, etc,

WILLIAM MONGEY,

Ard Haven,

Waterford.

The new priests' association

On September 15th next, in Portlaoise, a meeting of Catholic priests will take place to consider setting up an association of Irish priests. Some of these priests recently met in Athlone and discussed the possibility of encouraging a public voice for Catholic priests in Ireland. For a complete story on their agenda click HERE.
At first I thought it sounded like a good idea, and time will tell, but I was a little dismayed to see the people who are heading it up are all the 'Vatican II spirit' priests, who do not subscribe to the hermeneutics of continuity, but, more often than not, are part and parcel of the hermeneutics of rupture and discontinuity (as referred to by Pope Benedict in a recent communication). For more on the Pope and continuity see HERE

Maybe they will be part of the continuity, I don't know, but from what I've heard in the last number of years, they probably would be better off joining the Protestant community with which they seem to have a lot in common. Some of these priests already have a public voice through newspaper columns and weekly radio slots but it seems that the Holy Spirit cannot get near the programme line up because they cannot go beyond John O'Donohue and John Michael Talbot. John O'Donohue left the priesthood, was living with his partner until his sudden death in 2008. John Michael Talbot was a celibate monk, who got married in 1989.

Unfortunately John O'Donohue got bitten by the celtic spirituality bug and much of his work was on retrieving the earthiness of this same strange spirituality. If you check out google you'll find new-age, and neo-paganism under Celtic spirituality. There is no such thing as 'Christian, celtic spirituality'. There was pre-Christian spirituality, which was pagan, and part of Druidism and there is neo-paganism.

Some of the priests say that Pope John Paul II let them down. He led them to the top of the mountain but nothing happened! They forget that Jesus came down the mountain after the transfiguration, knowing that it was his death and resurrection that would bring about redemption. There can be no resurrection without death. You cannot take a helicopter ride to the top of the mountain and say you've climbed to the summit. There are no shortcuts to the Kingdom. We all have to take up our cross and follow Jesus if we want to be his followers. If not, then they should come clean, tell the world they have a 'wife' or a partner (male or female), do the decent thing, go to the nearest exit and join the communities who share their vision.

P.S. No offence to my Protestant brothers and sisters, it's just recognising the difference and allowing Catholics to be Catholics and Protestants to be Protestants or as Paddy Anglican said until very recently, Anglican!