Sir, - Bishop Willie Walsh, in the course of his recent talk at Knock (The Irish Times, June 19th), called for deep respect for unmarried mothers and irregular sexual unions generally, and for the celebration of the love they represent.
His remarks, if made in the Ireland of 50 years ago, might perhaps have presented a prophetic challenge to the Catholics of that time, for whom both the sacredness and absolute civic necessity of marriage were unquestioned.
In the Ireland of today, however, where traditional sexual morality and commitment to family life are more and more widely rejected, they constitute a mere swimming with the tide.
Yet co-habitation, single parenthood, divorce, and what in general is understood by sexual freedom are negative lifestyles; wilfully chosen, they are destructive of personal happiness and social solidarity.
In present circumstances, it is hardly a service of charity and respect to encourage these trends by viewing them through rose-coloured spectacles, or by failing to distinguish between those to whom these things happen and those who adopt them deliberately or through a thoughtless conformity to current fads. - Yours, etc.,
M. O'Flanagan, Glasnevin, Dublin 11.