Religion and private revolution

You don’t need a degree in Freudian psychoanalysis to realise the motivation behind Mary McAleese’s animus towards the Catholic Church. It’s as old as time, and the same reason why ‘moderns’ (of all eras) have always had a problem with Catholicism.

Essentially, it’s because the Church won’t conform its teachings, particularly relating to human sexuality, to prevailing cultural norms.

It is common knowledge that a significant reason for Pope Benedict XVI retiring as Pope was due to the existence of a powerful homosexual lobby embedded at the highest echelons of the Vatican – the so-called ‘Lavender Mafia’.

This is not to focus on one aspect of human sexuality. The teachings on chastity are equally rejected by many heterosexuals. And no one is claiming the teachings are easy.

This is why the Church has the sacrament of confession. To help us to start afresh after we lapse.

The alternative is to wave the white flag and give in to the prevailing culture.

But most studies in this regard, for example, the 1960s sexual revolution, are not encouraging, and reveal a legacy of many ruined lives.

In his ‘Ethics’, Aristotle observed that: “Men start revolutionary changes for reasons connected with their private lives.” It seems that some things never change. Eric Conway Navan, Co Meath