The people are the Church
Last Saturday evening, having returned in a depressed state from Cavan's minor championship defeat to Galway in Longford, and having spent some time in mature reflection, I decided to attend evening mass in my local church. With about ten minutes to go to mass-time, I noted that both car parks were filling up quickly and those alighting from same were engaging one and other in typical rural topics - how did yiz get on in the bog?, I hear there's rain forecast, were you in Longford?, I hear he's having an extra collection for Trocaire this evening, aye, it's a good cause - them poor people.
By eight o'clock the church was full to capacity - a popular local family was having an anniversary mass; the choir, in full voice, got proceedings under way and with a fluency and sense of order, fine tuned since the church first opened its doors in 1831, a sense of peace and tranquillity descended on all present. At 8.40 the final hymn was sung and upon exiting the congregation divided as usual - some departing immediately, some engaging in conversation while others went to graves to remember departed loved ones. It was a mundane, uneventful and unremarkable occasion, you may say, and one that was replicated in a thousand Irish Christian churches over the weekend so why bother writing about it?
To that question I would simple reply that in its sheer uneventfulness and simplicity it carries a significance which has the potential to define the course of religious practice in our country into the distant future. Here are people happy with the practice and ethos of the religion into which they and their forebears were born. They may be shamed and annoyed by the reports of sinfulness and cruelties perpetrated by a small section of the leaders and guiding lights but they are people slow to anger and quick to forgive. Deep in their psyche are memories of past injustices and persecutions but, perhaps more importantly, there is a deep understanding of the vagaries and frailties of human nature. They will not be swayed in their views by the unending stream of abusive missives appearing daily in the national newspapers over the years from serried ranks of agnostics, humanists, hedonists, atheists and chronic cranks. In fact many, in sheer frustration, have stopped buying daily or Sunday newspapers in silent protest at what they regard as deliberately unbalanced news and opinion contributions.
This mindset is not alone the prerogative of Irish rural people, of course. A couple of years ago an American journalist, convinced that the continued negative content of what pupports to be news and particularly crime reporting in tabloid scandal sheets were, in themselves at least partly to blame for social misbehaviour and street criminality. To test his thesis he locked himself in a New York apartment for a month with no reading matter except for a daily copy of a British tabloid newspaper. When he emerged from his confinement he expressed himself as being so neurotic that he was fully prepared to attack and injure or kill the first person he met on the street. Touche.
In the Irish context I am not arguing that the rural people are not without their concerns - far from it. While the overall frontal assault on the church - instead of a well defined and fact supported de-frocking of those who have scandalised it - has without doubt moved them closer to their priests they know instinctively that change must come. To be fair much has been, and continues to be done, in the matter of childcare and protection. We know that when the furore caused by the publication of the Cloyne Report fizzles out it will, when it suits the media, be followed by further "revelations" - possibly from Raphoe. In this regard it would be remiss not to pay tribute and appreciation to the person charged by the Catholic Church with investigation and reportage of allegations of sexual crime in the church. He is Mr Ian Elliot, a Presbyterian who, by his meticulous pursuit of the truth and his measured and fair responses to media interrogation have been highly impressive.
To return to the question of change it may also be opportune to point out that an enormous amount of renovation has been carried out on churches of all denominations over the past few years. The generosity of the ordinary churchgoers has been extraordinary and the willingness of clergy to provide detailed and up-to-date financial and structural information at all stages has been very well received.
Decline
The decline in religious vocations has resulted in well organised and implemented increases in lay participation and the establishment of pastoral councils and church committees has released the clergy from many standard and time consuming duties.
However, and this is perhaps more relevant to the Catholic rather than other denominations, the question of how to bring church direction, transparency, doctrine and governance closer to the ordinary people is one that will require many years of thought, reflection and progress. In my view (humble as usual of course!) the trappings of wealth must be reduced and eventually obliterated. Personally, I have for many years been uneasy with the fact that the Vatican, the earthly epicentre of the Church of Christ, holds perhaps billions of euro worth of priceless artistic treasures in Rome while in many parts of the world members of that same church go hungry. Closer to home, I suggest that while the vast majority of priests and bishops live modest and even frugal lives, the continuing use of rambling old Victorian semi-mansions as residences is a little incongruous in the modern world.
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