They must have been dubious… They must have worried that they’d be left sleeping in the fields or laughed out of the towns they visited. And yet, with the power of Jesus’s name and the gospel they were spreading, they went out and did it, and they did great things despite having precious little in terms of the backing you would think they needed.
The Church here in Ireland needs to look at those 72 Disciples and draw a lesson from them and their courage, because if you read the signs of the times in today’s Ireland, it’s going to become increasingly difficult to live the life of a committed Christian and to openly preach the Gospel.
Last Thursday night the Civil Partnerships Bill made its way through Dáil Éireann without a vote. If it’s approved by the Seanad and signed by the President, it’ll become the law of the land. In essence, a new form of marriage is being created in Ireland without the sort of public debate and serious consideration such a momentous step calls for.
Our Catholic Bishops opposed the Bill on two main grounds. First of all, by creating this new institution of ‘Civil Partnership’ the government is not respecting the role of the family – and in particular marriage – as the basic foundation stone of our society.
Secondly, there is no provision in the Bill permitting people who don’t believe in ‘Civil Partnership’ for whatever reason to exercise their right of conscience to not participate in them. It seems as though if you have a hall or hotel which you’re willing to hire out for weddings or if you’re a photographer or a baker who normally does wedding work, you won’t be permitted to say I have no interest in facilitating Civil Partnerships. You could find yourself open to criminal prosecution. If you took on the job of a Civil Registrar thinking that you were going to be dealing with marriages, you’ll now be forced to deal with Civil Partnerships. The basic freedom of freedom of conscience is being undermined in our State. Our basic right to say I disapprove of that, I have no interest in that, therefore I’m not going to play a part in that is being taken away from us.
Now, I’m sure that there are people here who don’t have a huge problem with the Civil Partnership Bill. All I can do this evening is to ask you to read the Bishops’ Statement Why Marriage Matters which is available on the Irish Bishops’ website and encourage you to read some solid Catholic material about the meaning of marriage. The Catholic understanding of marriage has not had many voices speaking up for it in the newspapers, on the radio or on TV for the past few decades. It’s not based on hatred, it’s not based on unjust discrimination – it’s a positive, live-giving understanding of marriage, but because it poses a challenge to people, it does not receive a fair hearing in the media.
Anyway, a number of things worry me about the passing of the Civil Partnership Bill. Minister Dermot Ahern described it as being one of the most important human rights pieces of legislation dealt with by the Dáil. And, yet there was precious little coverage of it in the media. If you were following the papers and the TV for the past couple of weeks, you’d think that the legislation about stag hunting was the big story of the week. Big, big news, but very much under-reported… You have to wonder if those who influence the media wanted this legislation about Civil Partnerships to slip through without people kicking up a fuss. Were they trying to slip it past conscientious Catholic, Protestants, Jews, Muslims and other people who would have reason to raise questions?
The second thing which worries me is the way the Bishop’s Statement Why Marriage Matters was received by our political class. It was initially released in March, and the Bishops issued a statement drawing people’s attention to it again a couple of weeks ago. When they did this, Minister John Gormley started complaining about the Church ‘interfering’. He tried to put it about that the Catholic Bishops had no democratic right to present the teaching of the Church. Every other group in society – trade unions, political parties, sporting organizations and so on, they all have a right to comment on the big issues which affect the life of our country, but when the Church says a few words on the value of marriage, then prominent politicians try to silence her. Why is that? What is it that makes some members of our political class behave so irrationally when we try to have our democratic say?
Incidentally, Archbishop Dermot Martin was speaking to the St Joseph’s Young Priests’ Society in Knock last week. He pointed out how the politicians were giving out to the Bishops last year for not telling people to vote ‘Yes’ to the Lisbon Treaty. Now, 12 months later, when the Church has something to say about marriage, there’s an attempt made by the politicians to shut the Bishops up.
Another politician who had something to say about the Bishops’ contribution was Minister Dermot Ahern. He said that he was of the opinion that politicians shouldn’t allow religion to cloud their judgement. I suspect that quite a number of politicians, public figures and journalists would say something very similar. And, yet, that kind of thought shows a huge misunderstanding of what religion is and what role it has to play in a democratic society. Now, let me be quite clear – there’s no justice in any politician trying to impose his religious beliefs or religious practice on the people he’s governing. Our Catholic faith insists that the State has no role in coercing anyone’s religious beliefs. It’s one of our fundamental human freedoms. However, this freedom which is recognised in our constitution does not mean that everyone who is elected to public office has to pretend to be a non-believer when making decisions. Religious believers can be objective and fair without being asked to switch off part of their brains or deny their fundamental values.
If you allow yourself to be formed and shaped and informed by the Gospel of Jesus Christ, that shouldn’t be a disadvantage to you in political life. If you love God and sincerely want to serve your neighbours in the political life then your religious faith is not clouding your judgement. If your faith gives you a strong understanding of what’s right and wrong and how the common good can best be served, then that’s not something you could or should lock away in a box when tough decisions have to be made. Dermot Ahern might just as well have said that politicians shouldn’t allow their conscience, their understanding of right and wrong to cloud their judgement.
The holy Capuchin priest Ven. Solanus Casey once referred to religion as the science of our happy relationship with God and our neighbours. That’s not something you’d ever want to set aside. However, it’s becoming clearer that many of our country’s leaders, most of whom claim to be Catholic, are tending towards an understanding of faith and religion as something totally private, something that offers a little personal consolation, a little bit of a spiritual high and some nice ceremonies, something one does in one’s spare time, but isn’t mentioned in polite society, and certainly doesn’t influence what one does with the rest of one’s life. That’s not healthy, that’s not true religion, and it ignores the great work done by literally millions of Christians in shaping society for the better because of their faith. Racial equality and an end to slavery was a proudly Christian cause in so many places. Many of our Irish missionaries fight for the dignity of the poor and downtrodden throughout the world. Would we say to them that they should set their religion aside, their strong sense of right and wrong to one side as they campaigned for the God-given rights of those who suffer? Would we dare tell them that their religion is clouding their judgement?
The third thing that worried me was that the legislation passed through the Dáil on Thursday night without a vote. One TD – a Presbyterian, by the way – did speak in favour of the sort of conscience clause which Catholic, Church of Ireland, Baptist and Presbyterian religious leaders had lobbied for. However, he got precious little support and I don’t think that one politician on Thursday night objected outright to the Bill. All the major political parties seem to have supported the Bill and I don’t think that any of the major political parties were willing to allow their TDs the right to reject the Bill. The whip was on. Does that seem right to you? That such important and controversial legislation made its final passage through the Dáil on a nod and a wink, that we didn’t see any significant opposition to it. It’s obvious that the membership of Dáil Éireann don’t adequately represent public opinion. Was there even one Catholic member of the Dáil willing to take a stand in favour of marriage and the Constitution?
Just before the last General Election in the UK, the Scottish Bishops issued a very strong statement. They said:
In urging you to let your faith count at the ballot box, we ask you to think carefully before you cast your vote. Which candidate displays values closest to yours? Which candidate will best respect and protect your religious freedom and your freedom of conscience? Which candidate do you trust most to do a good job for you and your community?
As your bishops, it is not our intention to tell you which party to vote for. It is our duty to encourage you to engage with the political process and to vote for the candidate who best represents the values we, like our parents and grandparents before us, hold dear.
Archbishop Conti of Glagow went further by pointing out that none of Britain’s mainstream political parties were willing to stand up for the right to life from conception to natural death, for the institution of marriage or for the rights of conscience.
One wonders if we could say the same about the Irish political parties. There are some members of the Seanad of various political parties and none who are lobbying for a free vote when the Civil Partnership Bill reaches them next week. Watch that space. See what kind of support marriage and the rights of conscience get from our politicians and our media.
I’m afraid I’ve gone on at some length. But I want you to be quite clear what situation faces us in Ireland at the moment. The values of those who run our newspapers, television and radio stations do not – in the main – seem friendly to our Catholic values. Amongst our political class there seems to be a huge amount of confusion or misunderstanding or hostility to our values. The law of the land is changing in ways which will certainly be actively hostile to our positive and life-giving understanding of human life, marriage and the importance of conscience. In many ways – in terms of our own understanding of these issues, our grasp of Church teaching, our use of the media, we as Catholics are ill-equipped to deal with the challenges which the changing nature of Irish society offers us. In the medium term I see a number of battles down the road for us – a defence of the right to life for the unborn and those who are ill; a defence of the right to palliative care; a defence of the rights of parents; a defence of the rights of our Catholic schools; a defence of the rights of doctors to practice according to their consciences; a defence of the rights of our own consciences to follow Catholic teaching and to preach it publicly.
If you are sincere in your faith – if what you celebrate in this Church means something to you, you have an obligation to be ready for these battles. An obligation to study your Catholic faith, to question your political leaders, to treat the opinions you read in the newspapers with scepticism. An obligation to pray, to spend time with Christ, to ask his help in deepening your faith and your understanding of the world around you.
And yet, we have the example of the 72 Disciples before us. They were sent out – materially under-equipped and with nothing but Christ’s name. They came back rejoicing having worked great deeds in Jesus’s name. The Gospel of Christ is still the one salvation offered to us. Let us never be afraid to listen to it and proclaim it with confidence.
