Sir, - I noted with interest than Bishop Flynn dismissed the research which Michael Hout and I reported recently as evidence that Ireland is now a secular country. As to the latter fact, the matter is not quite so clear. The work of Irish sociologists, most notably Chris Whelan of the ESRI, suggests that the reality is far more ambiguous and problematic than the Bishop suggests.
However, I fail so see how he finds evidence for secularisation in the sympathy of the Irish respondents for non-doctrinal institutional reform in the church. Were the citizens of Milan "secular" when they elected St Ambrose? Indeed most of the institutional reforms which our respondents support would in fact be a return to older and more traditional practices.
Is it "secular" to support a married clergy (80 per cent of our respondents)? Surely the bishop knows that for much of the middle ages the Irish church had in fact a married clergy and hierarchy. He must be aware that the role of abbot in many monasteries was passed on from father to son. He certainly knows about the family dynasties in many dioceses. He cannot be ignorant of the legendary MacGwires, and their patriarch Pearse McGwire. Or were those secular times, too? Was Simon Peter "secular" because he had a wife?
Finally, in his appeal to the Gospel message, the bishop seems to imply that those who advocate non-doctrinal reform have left the church. As we would say in "Great Ireland" beyond the waves, Bishop, ya gotta be kiddin! - Yours, etc.,
Professor of Social Science, The University of Chicago,
Chicago,
USA.