Eighty-three years ago Irish voters free to do so enacted a liberal democratic constitution which guaranteed freedom of, and freedom from religion.
It recorded the statistical fact that the Roman Catholic Church was the guardian of the faith professed by the great majority of the citizens.
The great majority of the minority of citizens NOT of the Roman Catholic persuasion were, like Roman Catholics, baptised Christians, and the tiny Jewish community shared with the Christians a monotheistic faith, and like them attempted to obey the Ten Commandments, and when they failed had the failures on their consciences.
Non-believers were not noticeably more likely to murder their neighbours, rob them, lie about them, get drunk, fornicate or commit adultery, so far as I know.
The majority of citizens today still describe themselves as Catholics but most of them have jettisoned the ballast that previously kept them on the straight and narrow or bothered their consciences when they strayed from it.
Non-Catholics, in the main, appear to have kept their principles, and their heads.
Dr Garret Fitzgerald, who should have known better, launched what he described as a “Crusade ” to woo Northern Protestant Unionists into a United Ireland by “liberalising” laws, with the insulting implication that the disciples of Calvin and John Knox could be bought with a relaxation of laws handed from God to Moses.
Today in the 26 Counties , Heaven knows Anything Goes. Infants are aborted on demand, and assisted suicide, whether we wish it or not can be imposed on us, and those doctors who still adhere to the Hippocratic Oath will be obliged ,by statute to pass their patients on to thosedDoctors who dishonour it.
Comments are closed.