Madam, - If Kevin Myers tries to convince me that Cardinal Newman was really an Irishman who fought for freedom in the Boer War, I may listen and be amused. But when he presumes to give a lecture on the primacy of architecture over liturgy in our churches, my smile tightens (An Irishman's Diary, October 21st).
Churches are not exhibits in a contest for architectural excellence; they are not museums or mausoleums to be admired; they are places - in the Christian tradition - where people gather to remember and celebrate. If they are not suitable for this, then by all means hand them over to the Kevin Myers Heritage Trust.
Churches created by Pugin and other goths of Victorian repute have merits as buildings of excellence. They excite an aesthetic response in the airy mountains of the Myers intellect. But, perhaps - and I hesitate to say it - perhaps they do not suit the proclamation of the Word or the celebration of the Eucharist. Perhaps the Bishop of Cloyne is more concerned with St John than with Vitruvius - a lamentable inclination in a bishop as seen from D'Olier Street, but an understandable one from the perspective of those of us who use these places.
John Henry Newman maintained that to be holy and human, one needs to change and change often. We may allow the Bishop of Cloyne to do the same. - Yours, etc,
TOM FINNIGAN, Malin, Co Donegal.