Armagh, Northern Ireland, Feb 27, 2017 / 06:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Ahead of Northern Ireland’s assembly elections, the region’s Catholic bishops have reflected on situation facing voters and the importance of voting with well-formed consciences.
“Far from separating us from concern about society and its development, the Gospel commandment to love one’s neighbor as oneself commits us ‘to work for the good of all people and of each person, because we are all really responsible for all’,” said the bishops, citing the Compendium on the Social Doctrine of the Church.
The Feb. 22 message was signed by Archbishop Eamon Martin of Armagh, Primate of All Ireland, and other leading Catholic bishops.
Northern Ireland’s Assembly elections will take place March 2. The vote for the region’s legislative body follows political controversies regarding overspending on a renewable energy heating program, which called into question the power sharing agreement between the Democratic Unionist Party and Sinn Fein.
Deputy First Minister, Sinn Fein’s Martin McGuinness, resigned in protest Jan. 10 over allegations that First Minister Arlene Foster of the Democratic Unionist Party mishandled the project. The resignation triggered the elections.
In this climate, the bishops said, “the premature collapse of our political institutions is a serious matter for all of us.” Despite progress towards peace and prosperity in the 20 years since the pivotal Good Friday Agreement, they saw a return of “bitter language and tone of conflict” to political discourse.
They noted the sacrifices political leaders make, but also reflected on politicians’ duties “to help shape a healthy, positive and peaceful society in which there are ample, quality jobs, decent housing, comprehensive healthcare, and first-class education for all.”
Northern Ireland’s bishops encouraged voters to reflect on Catholic social teaching in their decisions.
They stressed the need to build a culture that loves and cares for others, especially the most vulnerable. They cited Pope Francis’ call for a “revolution of tenderness” that replaces hardened hearts with “a sensitivity and active concern to protect all and care for all.”
Noting pressures to introduce legal abortion in Northern Ireland, the bishops rejected a “throwaway culture” that treats human beings as disposable. They said the region’s laws should equally value the life of both mother and unborn child, and not “diminish our humanity by destroying another human life.” They warned against efforts to portray legal abortion as “limited,” as the procedure always intentionally takes the life of an innocent.
“Central to the good news that the Church proclaims is that the life of every person is sacred and inviolable, irrespective of the stage or state of that life,” they said. This is a fundamental principle that every other human right presumes.
The bishops lamented “disturbing levels” of child poverty, with almost 110,000 children in Northern Ireland living below the poverty line. The region has some of the highest levels of the numbers of working poor and the disabled, in addition to other features of income inequality.
The bishops said voters should prioritize “the systemic and comprehensive eradication” of childhood poverty and the provision of other social needs.
They advocated for a constructive political culture based on “a shared commitment to the common good” instead of the constitutional issues that have traditionally played a key role in Northern Irish politics.
Many Catholics have found it increasingly difficult to find a political party for which they can vote in good conscience. The bishops said that in the absence of clear alternatives, Catholics should “maximize the good” and limit any potential harm through their election choices.
Northern Ireland’s bishops stressed the importance of recognizing marriage as the union of one man and one woman. To recognize other relationships equally undercuts the importance of the biological bond and natural ties between parents and children.
They cited Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation Amoris laetitia, which said same-sex unions are in no way similar to marriage and are not analogous to God’s plan for marriage and the family.
The bishops encouraged a welcoming attitude towards refugees who flee dangers including persecution, war, and natural disaster. They advocated an increase in the number of refugees resettled from Syria to Northern Ireland.
Similarly, the bishops voiced concern for the persecution of Christians abroad, as well as “subtle forms of exclusion and discrimination” against Christians in western democracies. They reported that local Christians have described a chilling effect in the region’s law and public policy that excludes church and faith groups from public funding or caricatures them in public debate because of their beliefs regarding marriage or their pro-life stand.
They noted the failure of the Northern Ireland Assembly to protect the right of a Catholic adoption agency to act in accord with its religion and voiced hope that this could change in the future.
They also rejected some views of “integrated” education that suggest Catholic schools do not contribute to reconciliation, tolerance, and understanding. In fact, the bishops contended, these schools have a Christian ethos that is “inclusive, welcoming and tolerant.” Some approaches to education reject parents’ rights to ensure a faith-based education for their children, and even cloak “a deep-seated hostility to the Catholic faith itself.”
Recommendations for voters also drew on Pope Francis’ encyclical on care for creation, Laudato si’, points out the challenges of environmental degradation and climate change. Northern Ireland’s bishops said caring for creation is good in itself and something owed to future generations.
They praised Northern Ireland’s leading role in the development of renewable energy technologies, and suggested the next Assembly should focus on further improving this aspect of the economy, while also encouraging protection for natural landscapes, fisheries, and other resources.
Further, the bishops noted the dangers of human trafficking and the “disturbing levels” of homelessness.
They noted the publication of an important report on historical institutional abuse in Northern Ireland and acknowledged that both Church and society failed to protect the vulnerable.
“We apologize unreservedly to all those who suffered from their experience in Church-run institutions, and to their loved ones,” the bishops said, acknowledging the inadequacy of apology while urging the report’s recommendations against abuse be rapidly established.
The bishops concluded their statement with ten questions drawn from Catholic social teaching that voters should ask candidates.
[…]
The Archbishop asked:
“How can we find the right attitude that does not force us to take one side to the detriment of the other? How can we keep the primary focus on the victims without forever rejecting the guilty?”
Allow me:
Remove Father Dominique Spina from the priesthood for raping a boy. Then Mr. Spina can do whatever. Problem solved.
Better still:
The Archbishop could remove himself from the episcopacy, thereby sparing himself the delicate task of rescuing a rapist.
Best of all:
Pope Leo removes Archbishop Guy from the episcopacy for gross negligence to act as a spiritual father. Perhaps the Pope can find a paper pushing job for him in the Secretary of State…
Yes, the Archbishop himself should be removed, but of course will not. It is horrible to see the Church hierarchy and many priests ignore and just dance around the straightforward commands of Scripture and great Christian thinkers like St. Augustine:
Romans 1:26-27
New International Version
26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.
1 Corinthians 6:9-11
New International Version
9 Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men[a]
10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
AND SAINT AUGUSTINE
“Those sins which are against nature, like those of the men of Sodom, are in all times and places to be detested and punished. Even if all nations committed such sins, they should all alike be held guilty by God’s law” (Confessions 3.8).
This is what normal thinking Catholic men say. But when they receive Holy Orders today, some seem to think it means pardoning evil AND PRETENDING LIKE IT NEVER HAPPENED. Until the Church gets real about expelling these men from the priesthood, NOTHING will be fixed. But I am beginning to think the bigger problem will be expelling these weak-minded men from the episcopate.
“Others in the end saw it as a sign of hope for abusers who had served their time and are experiencing the great trial of being totally shunned by society. For that I must ask forgiveness from the one I named and in whom I have confidence, for not having known how to find the right place to which he is entitled,” the archbishop further explained. 🤮
Speaking of “arousing suspicions,” bitter experience suggests that the Archbishop is not simply “weak-minded.” His simpering excuses are likely more than an act to survive. He chose to make a rapist his Chancellor. That’s audacious. Why? One reason would be blackmail. Another is that he and Fr. Spina are united, let’s say, at a minimum in their desire to normalize sex with children. 💋
It’s ecclesial idiocy that prompts me to make a move I’ve considered and studied
for the past few years: leaving the institutional Catholic Church and becoming
LCMS Lutheran.
How can a bishop be this incompetent and ignorant?
I think both the bishop and priest need to go.
It’s a disgrace.
In a healthy age of the Church, both would have been hung by outraged laymen.
“we have learned to look at these events first from the point of view of the people who were their victims and who suffer the consequences for the rest of their lives.”
Let us get this straight. So you contend that previously it was impossible to know that raping a child was an intrinsic evil? Or do you side with those “theologians” who say there are no intrinsic evils?
“Others in the end saw it as a sign of hope for abusers who had served their time and are experiencing the great trial of being totally shunned by society.”
Served their time?? How do criminal penalties absolve moral culpability and the need for repentance? And shunned by society? Anyone who embarrasses the Catholic Church has a great future in Hollywood.
“How can we find the right attitude that does not force us to take one side to the detriment of the other? How can we keep the primary focus on the victims without forever rejecting the guilty?”
I have an idea. Why not make an effort to discover the Catholic religion?
Too little, too late. Archbishop de Kirimel should fall on his sword and resign for even considering hiring a pedophile child rapist.
Let me get this straight. A priest who breaks the seal of Confession is automatically excommunicated, but a priest who rapes maintains his faculties and gets selected as chancellor for an archdiocese as “a sign of hope for abusers.” Maybe the latter should receive the same consequence as the former; maybe then the Faithful, to say nothing of the world at large, will believe that Church hierarchs actually care about the victims of abuse.
“For that I must ask forgiveness from the one I named and in whom I have confidence, for not having known how to find the right place to which he is entitled,” the archbishop further explained.”
What an interesting statement from the bishop. I wonder what might be the right place to which the rapist might be entitled.
This “apology” is effectively a way of saying, poor me; I made an innocent error by making an unpopular decision. But this priest is a fine man, made especially stellar as a symbol to all abusers. Yep, abusers everywhere will learn that they can become venerated if their abuse eventually becomes high profile.
We all complain about how the secular world hates the Church. But I nonetheless hope someday a prosecutor will arrest, try, and send to prison a bishop for aiding and abetting. What will it take to wake them up?
Up until quite recently in our state people who abused children that way were eligible for residency on death row.
I’m not a fan of capital punishment but it demonstrates how seriously a society takes crimes committed against minors. That seriousness seems to be lacking in this particular French archdiocese.
As with so many bishops who tolerated abuse, even in the U.S., this is not a question of
forgiveness. It is a question of competence and fitness for office.
These high clergy always hang on to office, never having the integrity
or the decency to resign.
The gospel of Jesus Christ is built upon the firm foundation of divine forgiveness. While it is a foundational truth of our faith that God’s mercy is sufficient for the atonement of all our sins, this divine prerogative does not fall within the purview of human authority. This distinction is critical when confronting grave offenses, particularly the egregious violation of a young boy by one entrusted with the sacred office of the priesthood.
Such an act is a profound betrayal of the pastoral covenant and a spiritual violence that renders a priest unfit to serve in any pastoral capacity. The dignity of the sacred office demands that such a person be removed completely from it, either to a life of perpetual penance in a monastery or through definitive removal from the priesthood. This is not a matter of human judgment superseding God’s mercy, but rather of upholding the integrity of the priesthood and ensuring the safety of the flock.
The actions of Archbishop Kirimel represent a grievous failure of pastoral duty. By choosing to overlook the deep spiritual and emotional harm inflicted upon the victim(s) and the wider community who bore witness to this sin, he has wounded the Church’s witness and fractured the trust of the faithful. Such a dereliction of office undermines confidence in the Church’s pastoral care, which is intended to be a source of healing and not further injury.
Generally, aside from lack of conviction, there seems an underlying affinity with the abuser cleric. We’ve developed into an institution in which effeminacy and same sex attraction is a commonly accepted behavior trait. Not until that’s effectively addressed does it appear it will end. How to address it in our already effeminized culture is the difficulty. Perhaps another St Peter Damian elevated to supreme pontiff.
Agree wholeheartedly, Father Morello. The cancer within the Church must be excised. We all know what that cancer is; only some have the conviction of faith to say it aloud – homosexuality.
I did not want to comment that article because what to comment? Isn’t it all clear? One does not need to be a Catholic to know how to deal with this situation. And it is so shocking to see that a Catholic (archbishop) does not know that. This is a dead end.
But I will say this: you are right, a normal man (no matter of what faith or without a faith), when he deals with such a situation, intuitively knows that he must protect the weak and abused. He even does not know that, it is an instinct which makes a man a man. All those crimes are done by men who have no true maleness. They are pathetic. It is a very small comfort for victims to know that but nevertheless it may help some: those men are pathetic weaklings.
How much longer do the laity have to suffer the abuse by priests and bishops before the laity rises up and takes each offender out into the public square and tars and feathers them? How much longer? I know that I, for one, have reached my threshold of tolerance.
Bishops who are morally corrupt cannot even understand the optics of absolute corruption. This clown should be removed from the episcopacy and forced into penance and silence.
One of the previous letter writers said homosexuality is the problem. No, homosexual acts are the problem. Homosexuality is a cross for the bearer, and if embraced as a cross can lead to sainthood. This doesn’t, however, imply that homosexuals can or should be priests. Homosexuals should not be ordained.
Thomas Heenan: Agreed. When I say that homosexuality is the problem I mean acts that are homosexual in nature and/or a disposition to make homosexuality a normative variant of sexuality which it is not. Those who do carry this burden and for whom it might be the source of grace in the struggle against homosexual acts, I would say are “same sex attracted.”