Once abolish the God and the government becomes the God - GK Chesterton
During the last few days of May, there was only one news story being talked about in Ireland.
That story was the farcical (but hilarious) abandoned court case being brought on behalf of TD Maria Bailey. The Fine Gael politician had comically fallen off a swing on a night out and was pursuing a case to have her medical expenses returned. In embarrassing fashion, she decided not to take it to court after ensuing public outcry.
The onslaught of brutal memes, as well as the anger at her perceived entitlement, showed no signs of stopping. It could not have come at a worse time with a European and local election under way and with the Irish government still smarting from criticism over Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy’s faux pas over suggestions of ‘shared living’. Murphy had stupidly suggested that Millenials could overcome their current housing crisis by living together in government built modern equivalents of tenements.
Famished for ideas on how to turn the tide of negative publicity, Fine Gael seem to have made a decision to coordinate a diversionary online attack against their favourite target…Catholics.
Already receiving vicious comments from all around the world, Bishop Thomas Tobin of Rhode Island, with a mere 5,000 followers on Twitter, became their target.
Tobin’s innocuous tweet was made completely in line with Catholic teaching and common sense. What has any Catholic to gain from attending such a weekend? Nothing. In fact if one believes in as basic a concept as sin, the whole weekend in any part of the world is something to be avoided. It is one thing to be, as the Catechism instructs, loving and encouraging towards someone who has a same sex attraction. It is another thing altogether to attend an event awash with debauchery, nudity and substance abuse. A Catholic Bishop warning people to refrain from occasions of sin at Pride is like an Imam warning Muslims to stay away from barbeques on the beach during Ramadan.
Discussing Theology with Fine Gael however is like talking Economics to Fine Gael. Or explaining the basic Biology of the unborn child to Fine Gael. Or suggesting a social policy that does not involve creating 10,000 homeless people to Fine Gael.
By the weekend of June 2nd, it appeared as though they had collectively decide to reply in as inane a manner as possible to Tobin’s tweet. The very same politicians who had collectively ignored terror attacks against Catholics in Sri Lanka, supported abortion with no pain relief up until birth and drive thru divorce had suddenly decided to lecture a bishop on how to conduct real Christianity.
The God I know doesn’t abort children Josepha. The number of Catholics is rapidly increasing with each passing year Catherine. And Charlie, if there’s one word people do not use to describe Fine Gael, compassion is it.
None of this childish behaviour is new or surprising, but it is growing tiresome.
During the Referendum to Repeal the Right to Life, Senator Catherine Noone had entered Ireland’s most important Marian Shrine at Knock during Easter and live tweeted disrespectful and ageist abuse towards the priest. Likewise, despised Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy was able to court cheap publicity during the same referendum by dragging his children away from a Church during Mass and ringing up a national radio show to let them know all about it.
Josepha Madigan is probably the most problematic out of all of these individuals involved in the orchestrated pile on against Tobin. A supposed practising ‘Catholic’, Madigan proudly boasts on her Twitter Bio of her role in removing the right to life of unborn children in Ireland as well as her campaign to make sure that divorce times would be radically reduced. She has been prominent in using her position as Minister to hold conferences demanding that the Church ordain women priests. Susan from the Parish Council made large.
All that aside, why does this issue irritate a government who are indifferent to virtually every problem in Irish society? To put it simply, Fine Gael have managed to stay in power for so long by buying off the electorate with a plan for the unlimited ‘progressive’ sexualisation of society. Same Sex Marriage and Abortion were used in referendums to convince people that the Church were the enemy of the people while Fine Gael were the hip young knights in shining armour. For the most part, and to their discredit, the Irish people have been happy to forego economic prosperity if it means receiving the so called sexual freedoms delivered to them by Fine Gael.
In light of this strange political setup, it is high time that Catholics in Ireland stopped entertaining these intrusions into the day to day running of the Church. With the exceptions of Bishop Doran and Bishop Cullinan, the leadership in the Church has been too timid and too concerned with self preservation when it comes to speaking to the faithful about important topics. This has happened to the extent that there are people like Josepha Madigan being allowed to ‘say Mass’ in the absence of a priest while also reading regularly in the Church of St. Therese in South Dublin. A Church with its tail between its legs has allowed MEP Maria Walsh to host an event in a Catholic Church in Mayo, with the permission of the Parish Priest. Not only that but speaking in front of Catholic students, surrounded by Catholic statues as she lowered the Irish flag to replace it with a rainbow flag at Colaiste Mhuire in Galway.
The list of interference, bad theology and general heresy goes on and on.
Leo Varadkar taking a break from writing fan mail to Kylie Minogue to call for priestesses and married priests.
Enda Kenny stating that he is Catholic but doesn’t really believe in the Eucharist while also shutting down the Vatican embassy.
Alan Shatter calling for Confession to be government regulated.
The Irish State need to start focusing on things that are actually within their control such as rising drug problems, homelessness and the inability of anyone under the age of 30 to be able to build a life for themselves. It would serve Irish people well, if they are really serious about being post Catholic, not to be distracted so easily by cheap publicity stunts designed to deflect from an incompetent government.
That the State should mind their own business is self evident. The question that remains for Catholics is, what can we do about it?
Naturally, one can get caught up in being aghast at the unfairness of it all, especially the singling out for criticism in a time when Muslim clerics in Ireland have said much harsher things in public about homosexuality. And one can likewise reminisce about times when Ireland seemed less snide towards those of faith than it is now. However, there are still souls that need to be led to heaven and there is still the business of honouring June for what it actually is, the month of honouring the most Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ. In the same way that the Sacred Heart inspired French Catholics impinged upon by a cruel secular government in the wake of the French Revolution and later on the Cristeros of Mexico, so too can Irish people draw solace and strength from the devotion. Although they may not line up priests to be executed, as the Mexican government did to Blessed Miguel Pro, the Irish government are determined to line up faithful Catholics on social media and expect the public at large to hurl abuse and accusations of bigotry at them.
Such things should not worry us.
This government will pass away. The Irish electorate will do the usual routine of loathing them in retrospect, as they do to the governments of Bertie Ahern and Charles Haughey. Meanwhile, the ensuing social media storm has only drawn attention to some of the shocking scenes of children having to see fully naked grown men during Pride parades as well as the infamous photo of revellers mocking a statue of Christ at Dublin Pride last year. That is what leadership does. Bishop Tobin started a conversation, people are talking.
The non existent theology of Minister Madigan and friends is reminder to Catholics that we cannot change the world without first improving from within. If there are people, believers or not, graduating from supposed Catholic schools after seeing an alleged practising Catholic raise an LGBT flag, what hope do they have? When someone like Madigan is allowed to read at Mass, what impression is she supposed to have?
Maria Walsh said this week that “I am an LGBTQ community member and I'm still happy to call myself Catholic. My sexual orientation is just one thing about me, as are my religious beliefs.’’
“Do they work together? Not necessarily in terms of the Pope or higher-beings, but it I've never been turned away by any church. For me, perhaps it would change if I ever got turned away from a church. I would hope that my parish priest would give me a blessing, maybe he can’t or maybe he won’t. ‘‘
If we are to believe her, it seems as though at no point does Walsh seem to have been told basic Catholic teaching, despite regular contact with a Catholic priest. Likewise, in spite of her involvement in the Church, Madigan does not seem to know of the spiritual danger to any person who has played such a despicable role in Ireland’s quick increase to 1,000 abortions each month. And the same goes for the rest of Twitter’s Fine Gael keyboard warriors.
Until Ireland has a Church that is strong enough spiritually, there will be misled people who think that ‘Pride’ month is completely compatible with Catholicism.
To get to that state from where we are now will involve bravery and hard work. It involves priests and bishops being willing to take very public criticism for stating Christ’s message of repentance. But surely that, painful as it might be, is better than what we have now, where the theologically illiterate amongst our political class feel bold enough to instruct a bishop on what Christianity is. Where they feel untouchable enough to remove Crucifixes from hospitals that they are aborting babies in at one moment and in the next to openly preach about how they know of what true ‘compassion’ is.
Even though Fine Gael TDs own an awful lot of property between them, they will never own the Catholic Church. That, belongs to Christ.
However, until the Bishops speak boldly with moral authority, it will be Fine Gael dictating public discourse on religion. With the sheer quantity and venom of attacks on the Church by Fine Gael, Catholics need to start waking up and demanding that their Bishops speak out. They need to have a word with Parish Priests who allow anti Catholic politicians to play a role in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. There needs to be questions asked about what can be done so that the Church are not producing generations of poorly catechised half Catholics who do more harm than good. At the back of it all, Catholics need to remember that they are completely free to speak the truth to one another with the salvation of souls in mind, and that no government mandate or public shaming can take that away. Forget the political consequences, souls are what matter the most.
This June, pray for the forgiveness of all those in Fine Gael, for all those who vote for them and their referendums and for all those who habitually attack Catholicism throughout Pride Month. Likewise, pray for our Bishops that they may learn to have courage and to stand up for the faith, as is their job.
Try to make some small act of reparation each day, through a charitable deed or a prayer.
Almighty God and Father,
we glory in the Sacred Heart of Jesus,
your beloved Son,
as we call to mind
the great things his love has done for us.
Fill us with the grace
that flows in abundance
from the Heart of Jesus,
the source of heaven’s gifts.
Who lives and reigns
with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God for ever and ever.
Amen.