Sir, - As a practising Catholic, I found Medh Ruane's article on the document One Bread, One Body (October 5th) deeply offensive. As a nationalist committed to the establishment of a lasting peace in my country, I found the arguments absurd. As a reader of The Irish Times since the tender age of 14 (and I am still on the right side of 40), I was surprised by its blatant sectarianism.
To indict the Eucharist as a cause of division and to therefore condemn those who adhere to the Catholic faith is an attack on the human right to freedom of religion. It also, incidentally, betrays a pitiful ignorance of the very nature of the Eucharist, the source of love by virtue of being Love itself, i.e. Jesus Christ. The claim that Catholics, by their love for Jesus Christ, thereby "condition" or limit their love for other people is plainly specious.
To accuse Catholics of undermining the spirit of the Belfast Agreement by refusing to dilute religious differences shows a poor understanding of what the Agreement sets out to do. Are we not trying to build a culture where differences of religion and tradition are respected and valued? Or did I get it wrong and does it only apply to non-Catholics? Will the "post-Belfast Agreement society" have room for any divergence of views at all or will there only be one "church", the State?
To attack the right of religious leaders to teach their faithful about what they believe and the right of the faithful to receive that instruction would be justified only if what was being promoted was harmful to the public order, such as burning places of worship or performing acts of intimidation. Jesus Christ in the Eucharist makes no such threats and nor, as far as I am aware, have the bishops of my church.
The article is a very good example of religious intolerance, which is hardly what your readers expect from The Irish Times. - Yours, etc.,
Dr Orla Halpenny,
Queen's Park,
Monkstown,
Co Dublin.