In the not too distant past, many priests often painted God in very dark colours. They often put more emphasis on the severity of the punishments which awaited those who voluntarily broke God's commandments than on His infinite mercy. They spoke more about hell than about heaven. God was portrayed as the severe judge rather than as the loving Father as so beautifully depicted in the parable of the Prodigal Son.

Today, the picture is completely different. Men, women and children hardly ever hear the word sin mentioned and hell seems to have become anathema. We have gone to the other extreme when in church, and especially on the media, priests and religious give the impression that they feel uncomfortable when they talk about the Church's teaching on moral issues and the duty of the Christian to abide by the precepts of the Church and God's laws on such issues.

This change in attitudes has recently been the subject of a lecture given by Archbishop Dolan of Milwaukee at the American College in Rome. The Archbishop said that preachers should challenge the people's complacency, and "shake things up" as Christ did, and not "soft-pedal the Cross".

Archbishop Dolan was reported to have told his listeners that perhaps the greatest threat to the Church today "is not heresy, not dissent, not secularism, not even moral relativism, but this sanitised, feel-good, boutique, therapeutic spirituality that makes no demands, calls for no sacrifice, asks for no conversion, entails no battle against sin but only soothes and affirms... Our preaching can then become cotton candy-ish: a lot of fluff, air and sugar but no substance."

He said that it was reasonable to expect priests to bring their own personality while delivering a sermon. However they must bear in mind, he added, that "the substance must be Christ" and not their own agenda. He criticised priests who made it a point to regularly speak of the Church in very negative terms. Archbishop Dolan said that whereas one should not turn a blind eye to imperfections in the Church, priests are in the pulpit "not to speak against the Church but to speak about her, for her, with for her, from her."

The Archbishop referred to those faithful (whose number, sadly, is rising everywhere, including here) who claim to believe in God but do not feel the need for the Church. "The folks have trouble with the Church. They want the King without the kingdom, Christ without His Church, and for us Catholics it's a package deal. Ordained ministers," he added, "are unequivocally 'men of the Church' as preachers and their duty is to 'teach what she does, not preach what we like'."

Although Archbishop Dolan's lecture and his sharp comments were inspired by and directed at the Church in the United States, priests and religious would do well to reflect on their great responsibility to preach the message undiluted, clearly and unambiguously, whether they are speaking from the pulpit and, no less, in front of TV cameras.