Cardinal Brady: selected quotes from his address

As the recent referendum on the Lisbon Treaty in Ireland suggests, at least some of those who were previously enthusiastic about the founding aims of the EU, both social and economic, are now expressing unease.

Successive decisions which have undermined the family based on marriage, the right to life from the moment of conception to natural death, the sacredness of the Sabbath, the right of Christian institutions to maintain and promote their ethos, including schools, these and other decisions have made it more difficult for committed Christians to maintain their instinctive commitment to the European project.

As Pope Benedict asked recently, “if the governments of the Union want to be ‘closer’ to their citizens, how can they exclude from Europe’s identity an essential element like Christianity with which a vast majority continues to identify themselves?”.

I was intrigued to discover last weekend that it was quite natural to expect the US presidential candidates to answer direct questions about their commitment to faith, their willingness to support faith-based organisations, their position on moral issues and how it would affect their appointment of public officials. I look forward to the day we have the same level of openness and choice in our own elections here in Ireland and in Europe.

As it is, in Ireland, as in much of the EU, the prevailing political correctness and dominant media culture is one of relegation of the search for truth and the value of religion in society in favour of a political environment without God.

Without respect for its Christian memory and soul, I believe it is possible to anticipate continuing difficulties for the European project. These will emerge not only in economic terms but in terms of social cohesion and the continued growth of a dangerous individualism that does not care about God or about what the future might have in store.

This article appears in the print edition of the Irish Times