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Post by guillaume on Jul 8, 2011 13:10:09 GMT
Terrific video of what is going on in this country :
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Post by hibernicus on Jul 10, 2011 16:21:36 GMT
The emphasis on Mass attendance is a bit beside the point - focussing on belief might have been a better idea and it would have produced an even more alarming picture (note the numbers who say thy only go with family). I suspect he was in Dublin at the time of the Gay Pride march about 3 weeks ago, hence all the stickers. Sad.
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Post by hibernicus on Jul 10, 2011 16:23:01 GMT
1500 years is a bit overstated - has he read what large sections of the Irish mediaeval Church were like? But he's quite right that this degree of formal apostasy is utterly unprecedented.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 11, 2011 20:22:32 GMT
I think the fact that the state was so entrenched with the Church factors in here. Irish people are cynical about people in power. We love having someone to kick and someone to sneer at while astride our high horses. I don't know what will happen but I sincerely believe that in a hundred years time the Church will be better for all that has happened. The Church cannot realistically be blamed for the state of the country down the line, although we do love a good brood... If the state is going to take control of everything and secularise us, I wonder who they'll blame when it goes pearshaped?
There is no point in forcing people to believe, there is a great need for parents to cathechise their own children, for people to learn apologetics and for us to point out when people are wrong about the Church. I do it all the time, I had a discussion with a colleague who was all asunder about the schools situation. I corrected her, and she was fascinated and at the end of handover told me that she was looking forward to explaining to her colleagues the next day (5 of them) how wrong they were. People are right to be cynical about the Church in Ireland. It will take a long time for them to realise that most of the paedophiles are dead or on the way to meet their maker. I always state that we are the Church. When you confront someone as a happy 28 year old woman and state facts with a smile on your face and offer more cake it rattles their bones. They're used to blathering without opposition. Our priests are going to be whipping boys for a long long time yet. We're the Church Militant, we need to defend the Church and present a living breathing viable Church to our neigbours. I don't even think it's down to priests now, the onus is on us now.
Was he at the Sacred Heart Novena in Gardiner Street I wonder?
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Post by hibernicus on Jul 11, 2011 20:31:28 GMT
I'm a bit gloomier than you are Banaltra. The English Reformation was due to a considerable extent to genuine abuses in the mediaeval church, yet Catholicism didn't end up stronger - it was quite successfully suppressed and demonised, and later generations grew up ignorant of Catholicism except as seen through a hostile lens. I think that is happening here. Bear in mind that corruption is self-perpetuating; once the new situation is accepted as the norm it becomes unimaginable for many people that things ever were or could be different, and even when the warnings of those who opposed the change are borne out it becomes unthinkable to go back to the status quo ante. Here's an interesting example of this sort of corruption. An American conservative columnist - himself not perfect by any means - notes that in a recent decision arguing that violent video games are protected like other artworks under the US constitution's free-speech provision, one of the more "conservative" SUpreme Court justices unwittingly illustrates how those who argued that the abolition of the concept of obscenity would lead to wholesale moral corruption have been proven right - but no-on's listening any more: www.jamesbowman.net/diaryDetail.asp?hpID=486EXTRACT There is more in the same vein — Homer, Virgil, Dante, William Golding — but we get the point. We can also see at once that there are certain differences between Hansel and Gretel and Grand Theft Auto, among them the fact that it is the malefactor who is killed in the former but the one who is doing the killing in the latter. Also, the reader is encouraged to identify himself with the endangered children in Hansel and Gretel, and to rejoice in their escape; the player of Grand Theft Auto, by contrast, is encouraged to identify himself with the killer and to glory in his slaughter. The same differences apply to all the other works cited by Justice Scalia. Up until only fifty years or so ago, everybody apart from a tiny cultural élite took it for granted that the popular arts had or ought to have had a moral purpose, and the law was happy to uphold what it called "community standards" by prohibiting obviously and avowedly immoral works or outrages against ordinary decency or good taste. When that consensus collapsed before the onslaught of the élite on behalf of Lady Chatterley’s Lover and Ulysses, there were those who predicted that moral chaos would ensue. These people have now been proven right. I think there is an argument to be made against graphic depictions of even the most virtuous killing — though Hansel and Gretel, being a story, would remain immune to censure on that ground — but the real case against video games and for the California law rests on the fact that even so wise and learned a man as Mr Justice Scalia apparently can no longer tell the difference between these two radically different kinds of "violence" and so regards depictions of both with the same moral indifference. END OF EXTRACT
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Post by naomhadomnan on Jul 12, 2011 8:53:13 GMT
Greetings fellow Irish Catholics, nár lagaí Dia bhfuair lámhaí!
I just got accepted as a member after waiting for months. Whoever is the moderator, thanks. Now it's time for me to come out guns blazing!
In my opinion, the Irish Catholic Church abandoned reason in trying to explain the faith and relied on a patronising sentimentality and wishy-washy superstition, devoid of any of the essential truths of the faith and empty of any true moral lessons about leading a virtuous life, proudly convinced that the Irish would always be Catholic no matter what pathetic nonsense they fed them.
They hierarchical elites abandoned catechesis, since they themselves stopped believing in Jesus and started believing in their own contorted version of him, and so the Holy Spirit left the Irish Church and it sank into sin and depravity. They could not preach truth, for they themselves refused to relinquish their own petty little vices, which over time bubbled up into terrible crimes.
Catechesis, Catechesis, Catechesis. This is the solution to the crisis! It is always the solution to every crisis in Catholicism. Catholics are the ONLY people who have a thoroughly rational approach to life because we have the Truth. We can prove God's existence through reason and absolutely every thing we do, every tiny movement the priest makes at Mass, has profound theological significance. Yet, we Irish have been robbed of the beauty of our faith by a few generations of lazy and proud clerics, who in reality hated Catholicism. Our Lord spoke about these traitors. Saint John Crysostom spoke of how the floor of hell is paved with the skulls of bishops and how few priests go to heaven. They need our prayers! Pray for the bishops!
We are told in the catechism that our point of life is to know, to love and to serve God. We cannot love and serve what we do not know. It begins with knowledge of God. I've only ever heard a few good sermons in Ireland (maybe two from the same young priest), is it any wonder the faith has been wiped out? Go to the audiosancto website for some great preaching.
The faith is not dead in Ireland. Irish people are born to love and die for Christ, it pumps through their veins. If we could just shake off all the modernist rot and return to the traditional Mass that countless Irish willingly gave their life for at the drop of a hat and abolish that new age spirit of Vatican two effeminate Mass, Ireland will be the light of the world again. The Irish people didn't change, the religion did. It became unrecognisable to Irish people, so they left it.
I myself have consecrated my life to the Blessed Virgin Mary, that I be given the grace to participate in the resurrection of the faith. As long as I live the faith shall not perish and I shall do all in the power God grants me to turn the tide. Who is with me?
Saint Thomas Aquinas, pray for us! Naomh Phádraig, guí ar ár shon! A Mhuire Mháthair, guí ar ár shon!
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Post by guillaume on Jul 12, 2011 11:50:26 GMT
That's an excellent post ! Welcome aboard new member and apologies for the delay... Hibernicus is the moderator of this little forum. I totally agree with what you wrote. Return to Tradition is the solution. But we have to recognize the will of the Holy Father. Different little signs are marking a slight return within the Novus Ordo "environment" like the new missal. There are also more Latin Mass available than few years ago, even if the application of the Motu Proprio is still too shy. I am sure that the Irish had kept their faith, even among the young generation. But it is "hidden" : it is a very little flame or a little seed still present but which had not been feed, or feed properly, in order to grow.
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Post by hibernicus on Jul 13, 2011 10:45:28 GMT
Naomhadamnan - Catechesis is essential but I don't think it is sufficient by itself. IN its classic format it existed to teach people the reasons for the belief they already held. We are not dealing with a population much more indifferent or hostile to Catholicism than ever before, so what we need is a combination of apologetics, to give the reasons for belief, and holy living, to show faith in practice. I attend the indult TLM myself, but if celebrating the TLM were sufficient the problem would never have arisen in the first place - there were plenty of shoddy celebrants in the old days, and the numbers of Irish Catholics who left the faith when they emigrated to Britain and America in the C19 and C20 before Vatican II suggests things are not as simple as you suggest. I might add that a lot of the worst criminals and their enablers were formed before Vatican II.
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Post by naomhadomnan on Jul 14, 2011 16:44:11 GMT
I agree Hibernicus. We have to rediscover the Christian spirit. The evils were bubbling up when we had the Mass and the Traditions.
Here's the few things I do: - Rosary every day - Read as many classics by the saints as I can - Attend the TLM as much as possible - Preach to everyone who will listen, family and friends, don't keep the faith to yourself and hide it from people (I struggle greatly with this one at times) - Try to perfect myself in virtue - Fast occassionally. Try and do it once a month and offer the sacrifice up to our Blessed mother - Dump TV, make Catholic friends and form a counter-culture centred on God and purity
I've had many miracles happen through the Rosary. That is the defining weapon. Also, be sure you understand the mysteries and the corresponding virtues that go with each one!
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Post by hibernicus on Jul 14, 2011 16:51:40 GMT
VEry good, Naomhadamnan - I try but I don't always succeed. Keep it going. One other point about your original post - you say the Irish people have Catholicism in their blood. Nobody had it in their blood - not the people of North Africa in the fifth century, not the English in 1500, not the French in 1780, not the Quebecois in 1950. A couple of generations without adequate cathechesis, with corrupt or incompetent leadership, without a strong enough leaven teaching by example, with strong counterforces telling everyone about the Bad Old Days under the thumb of the Bad Old Church, and presto! national apostacy except among a faithful and committed few. The process is pretty far advanced in Ireland yet even so there are many Catholics in Ireland who are still complacent, either from indifference or because they only mix with the zealous and therefore don't realise how far the rot has gone. We need to fight every step of the way.
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Post by naomhadomnan on Jul 14, 2011 17:28:36 GMT
Once again, I agree Hibernicus. Ultimately our poor island can become the worst of apostates.
On a side note, the Irish apparantly converted without any martyrs, the exception to the rule of "the faith is spread through the blood of martyrs". I put that down to the fact that Brehon law was madly obsessed with honour and duty to one's fellow kinsmen with a form of natural law. If a freeman saw a crime being committed, such as a child being murdered by an adult, and didn't intervene, he himself was guilty of the crime. Virtue legislation! Bring it back! ;-)
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Post by shane on Jul 14, 2011 17:57:45 GMT
It's true that the radical changes in the Church and the advent of the permissive society are not wholly responsible for the abuse problem, but I think they are definitely a factor. The recent John Jay report in the US attributed most of the blame to the sexual revolution. Andrew Brown had a good piece on it here: www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/andrewbrown/2011/may/21/child-abuse-catholicism-johnjayinstitute As he says (in the comments) of those priests formed before the Council, "[t]hey were trained in, and for, a prerevolutionary society, and found themselves working in a post-revolutionary one. Incidentally, the median time between ordination and abuse was 12 years."
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Post by hibernicus on Jul 15, 2011 19:20:33 GMT
But how does it relate to (let us say) the Christian Brothers in Letterfrack who abused John Tyrrell in the 1920s? One contributing factor has IMHO been a certain class bias within the Irish Church that has been in evidence for quite a long time. One of the most disturbing features of the report on the Dublin Archdiocese was the repeated instances of abuser priests being moved to working-class parishes on the grounds that parishioners there would be more deferential and less likely to make trouble if Father got up to his little games. One of the great weaknesses of Western Catholicism (and of the mainline Protestant churches) in recent decades has been its tendency to devolve into a middle-class club. One of the great strengths of traditional Irish Catholicism was its wide popular devotion. This has been thrown away in so many ways in recent decades, but this sort of swinishness has undoubtedly been part of the process by which it was dissipated. Jesus wept to see the sheep betrayed by hirelings...
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Post by naomhadomnan on Jul 16, 2011 9:38:34 GMT
I went to kiss the foot of Jesus at the Church of Medinacaeli in Madrid last night. It's packed every Friday night. All sorts of people, from every background, even young people before they go on their night out and couples dating and Mom and Dad with their kids all pack into this Church, queue up, kiss the foot, say a few prayers or possible the Rosary and then go on about their business. Such raw faith and devotion is awe-inspiring. The go goes out the Church down the block and around the corner at times. Families get taxis across town to kiss His foot and then go for dinner or a walk in the park. None of this cynicism that's found in northern European countries. This is culture. A FRIDAY NIGHT!
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Post by hibernicus on Jul 16, 2011 20:50:32 GMT
In relation to Brehon law - I wouldn't be so sure as Naomhadmnan that it was a factor. The point of any sort of honour code is that it only applies to people who are within the honour code (e.g. who are protected by kingroups). St Patrick says in his CONFESSION that he had to pay chieftains for protection - because as an outsider he was not automatically covered unless someonee was prepared to take responsibility for him.
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