Sir, - Your columnist Vincent Browne (Opinion, August 19th), in his wholesale condemnation of revolutions, American, French, and Irish (1916 and War of Independence), sounds like a hardline apologist of the ancien regime. His main point seems right to me: that it is monstrous for individuals or small groups of people to arrogate to themselves the right to speak for "the people", and conduct war and commit outrages in their name. But surely he should allow that if a regime becomes a tyranny acting against the welfare of the people it governs, the oppressed have a right to protest, to resist, and ultimately to overthrow the oppressive regime, preferably by peaceful means.
I was disappointed to see Mr Browne giving a travesty of what he calls "the Catholic doctrine of double effect". The first condition of any use of the principle of double effect is that the act being performed must be itself morally good or at least indifferent. Exploding a bomb in a busy street does not even begin to qualify. For that matter, exploding a bomb in an empty street would not qualify either, unless authorised by legitimate authority. It is absurd of Mr Browne to say that wiping out a few hundred innocent Iraqis or Libyans in order to kill their leaders is an application of double effect.
Thus, when he writes that "the Catholic doctrine of double effect is another piece of poison that has entered our moral language", he is condemning something he totally misunderstands. Actually there is nothing particularly Catholic about the principle of double effect, nor is it really a matter of Catholic doctrine. It is a way in which some moralists have tried to provide guidance in difficult moral problems, and it is used in informal ways by all sorts of people in ordinary life, e.g. would it be right to do something that endangers one's life in order to secure some good results? Its applications are quite limited, and planting bombs in streets is not one of them.
I believe Mr Browne is a cut above the anti-Catholic bigots that poison our media, and is generally fair and decent, especially in his radio programme. I am very sorry to see him write in this way. - Yours, etc.,
Rev Colin Garvey,
The Abbey,
Galway City.