Eamonn Clark, STL

Well I have really arrived.

There’s something about being fed properly – getting the right balance of flavors and textures and calories. While a full Irish breakfast is a bit hard on the arteries, there’s no denying that it’s going to keep you going, and there’s sort of something there for everyone.

I think that’s what’s been missing in the Irish Church for 50 years or so. It’s been lower and lower calorie, and the variety has been diminishing in relation to the growth in different tastes. But the textures and flavors are largely still there, giving the outward appearance that it’s business as usual. “People will still be well-fed. It’s going to keep them going.”

Not true.

Without a full rundown of the implosion that’s been happening here since the 1980’s or so, suffice it to say the following themes have emerged.

1. Several different kinds of systemic abuse and cover up.
2. Rather poor catechesis for the laity, and a general kind of disinterest in academic pursuits on the part of the clergy (or even downright suspicion).
3. An uncomfortable amount of collusion between the government and the Church that has begun to backfire.
4. Generally poor liturgy.
5. An overall pattern of “going through the motions” as to sacramental initiation and liturgical celebrations deeply interwoven with cultural norms (funerals, school masses, etc.).

This has resulted in a swath of empty pews and declining vocations. To top it all off, recent emigration and immigration patterns have been unhelpful for Church demographics. Young Irish are leaving, and many non-Christians or at least non-Catholics are entering the country (often under at least questionable circumstances).

It’s important to note that Ireland is a sparsely populated country with an extremely high cost of living. It has just over 5 million people (less than half the size of Paris metro area), which is about 3 million fewer than before the great emigration of the late 1840’s, during the Potato Famine. About two fifths of the population is in the Greater Dublin area (1/10th of the population is in the city proper). Dublin City has been in rather acute cultural decline in the past 5 to 10 years for a combination of reasons. The big tech companies (Facebook, Apple, etc.) come here for the tax benefits. It is the most expensive country in the EU to live in. Housing is particularly pricey right now. There is a strong movement which is gaining momentum in recent years to reunite with Northern Ireland, which has been officially separated from the mainland as a UK country since 1921 after centuries of protracted conflict between British and Irish, largely motivated by religious animosity flowing from the English Reformation – an important part of understanding what is going on here on the island.

A visitor like myself can easily be taken aback by what seems like a strong, booming echo of Ireland’s glorious past, mired in what is an increasingly dissonant noise of secularism. The institutional Church still has a very strong hold on many facets of Irish life… For example, almost all primary schools are run by the Church. And yet Catholicism here is on the fast-track to “all or nothing,” a reality which has been caused, ironically, less intensely by outward persecution by monsters like Cromwell than by distraction, bureaucratic and “soft” legal opposition, and most of all apathy. It makes for a new kind of rocky soil. Irish youth are inundated, just like American youth, with the siren songs of a deeply leftist media run by a cabal of progressive elites.

I was at a graveyard the other day… It is a good image for the country and the Church here, at least to some degree. There are all of these beautiful monuments, marks, indicators of something singularly existentially important… Some are more vibrant than others. But each tells a story.

And what lies beneath them will one day rise again, changed. And there IS hope here. Plenty of it. I will write more on that later.

Many more weeks to come, and much more detailed reflections to come as well… Be sure to subscribe!