This piece appears in The Sunday Letter in the parishes of Rathgar and Clonskeagh this week.
Michael Commane
There was a sentence in last Sunday’s Gospel that jumped off the page for me: ‘You know that among the pagans their so-called rulers lord it over them, and their great men make their authority felt. This is not to happen among you.’
But isn’t that exactly what so often happens in society?
In the past in Ireland the churches had far too much power in society. Many clergymen were served rather than they serving.
Surely priesthood is all about service.
Surely priesthood is all about service.
Isn’t that exactly what that sentence in the Gospel tells us?
Unfortunately, there’s something in the human psyche that allows our egos to run riot with us and with a little persuasion we can easily consider ourselves lords and ladies of the manor.
It’s fair to say that we have a fine Civil Service, a group of people who does Ireland proud. We call them public servants and that’s exactly what they are, because it is their job to serve the people.
What a shame when they get too big for their boots and they end up being served rather than serving.
What a shame when they get too big for their boots and they end up being served rather than serving.
We all know that when we serve people, whether it’s parents caring for their children, children keeping an eye out on their elderly parents, wherever someone is enhancing the life of another person, human beings are at their best.
The job of the church is to serve.
Watching the World Family Day event in Croke Park when Pope Francis was sitting up on the podium flanked by Archbishop Diarmuid Martin and Cardinal Kevin Farrell it struck me how nicer and better it would have been, instead of three men sitting on those seats, had there been a woman sitting where Cardinal Farrell was.
No, it would not have been a PR stunt. The optics would have been right and the story it would have told. The message it would have told had the provincial of the Presentation or Mercy Sisters, or someone from a congregation of Irish religious sisters been sitting beside Pope Francis. Why did they not have a woman beside the pope?
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