Madam, - It does seem that congratulations are in order for The Irish Times, as the ever more strident and viciously anti-Catholic letters and articles which you continue to print have succeeded in enabling some of the worst bigots in our society to make appallingly intolerant and inaccurate statements about the Catholic Church, and its clergy in particular - statements which by any standards of accuracy and decency should never be printed in a reputable paper.
Your recent publication of a letter (November 1st) whose author called for the arrest and deportation of any clerics who advocated that canon law should take precedence over the law of this country is a sad example of the bigoted nonsense in your paper which can drag serious issues into, and sometimes well below, the gutter.
It is accepted in most Western democracies that a priest is not obliged to reveal anything of what he is told in the confessional and it is clear that Catholics support this concept of the total privacy of the confessional. This is a common, real-life example of canon law taking precedence over the law of our country - confessional privacy not being explicitly recognised in law. Should we thus deport every person who supports the privacy of the confessional and seek to charge them with treason, as your letter-writer seeks with our clerics, or is this another example of anti-Catholic bigotry which finds an easy outlet in your paper?
Does your paper not have a responsibility to require a modicum of sense and accuracy in an article or letter before you will publish it? Your consistent publishing of hate filled letters or articles which carry no weight of sensible argument must, I suggest, lead reasonable people to question what standards, if any, are being enforced.
I plead with you to support reasoned debate on topics of interest but stop supporting and encouraging the bigots in our midst; such people do not easily give up on their repugnant notions as they seek a target, a scapegoat, for their devouring, hate-filled intolerance. - Yours, etc.,
E. BRENNAN, Lucan, Co Dublin.