Church has duty to ‘enrich’ politicians – bishop

Mr Tony Camilleri

Sep 13th 2011, 10:36

They have enriched themselves dear Bishop.
AT OUR EXPENSE.

Ms Sabrina Borda

Sep 12th 2011, 15:30

The bishop goes far to assume the church is competent enough to teach politicians. That's rather ostentatious and ironic of him to say the very least.

Gerry Cowie

Sep 11th 2011, 22:53

I just knew there would be secularist outrage from as soon as I saw this article! One man wishes to remove Article 2 from the Maltese constitution! But nobody can deny the Catholicity of Malta except those who do so selectively as it suits their personal agenda to do so! Thank heaven the people of Malta do not pay heed to the diatribe that comes constantly against the Church, that Church which the gates of hell - ie secularism - will never prevail against, as Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself said. Of course it does not stop secularists from knocking at the gate, though they will never succeed!

Malta will never become the secularist outpost that those such as William Flynn of Australia keep pushing for. The voting public will never allow it. Much to the chagrin of the secularists Malta will continue in its Catholic way of life and the beliefs of the people will always colour their words and actions. No matter how loudly the secularists and humanists shout, they cannot and will not remove God from his own creation!

When will those who detest the Catholic Church so much - and they give no reason for their blind hatred of the national religon of this country - realise that Maltese citizens in general do not wish to have their constitution and their way of life interfered with?

Well done to Bishop Grech, who is quite used to such opposition from a very few people at home and abroad, for standing up and saying what the Church is duty bound to say!

Raymond Sammut, how do you intend to oust the Church from Malta, the Church to which the majority belong? What an uphill task you have!

Roger Tirazona, I think you will find that a lot of laws are based on sound Christian principles! These cannot be swept under the carpet and the credit given to secularism. That patently is not the case! Denial of the obvious is useless here! Why should God not be involved in the historical events mentioned? And remember that infallibility is limited to certain matters of faith and morals and does not cover every word uttered by the Pope.

The trouble with secularism is the "me, me, me" society where personal choice comes at the top of the list and leads to evils such as abortion. Now there is something that will get a few comments!

Long Live Catholic Malta, free from the pitfalls and evils of total secularism!

Francis Saliba M.D.

Sep 11th 2011, 16:39

Gozo Bishop Mario Grech is wise and conscientious enough not to be dissuaded, by the usual heckling ungodly secularists from doing his duty unflinchingly to teach and to enrich all his audience - politicians not excluded. He is not answerable to these noisy secularist hecklers but to God, just as we all are - politicians not excluded.The Bishop is not answerableand accountable to anybody on earth and moreover he does not have to face an electorate in a few months time. Our politicians have to that.

victor caruana

Sep 11th 2011, 16:30

Tista jekk joghgbok ma tkomplix tindahal fil-hajja sekulari taghna. Mhux kulhadd Ghawdxi u jingibed minn imniehru!!!!!

Mr Joseph Calleja

Sep 11th 2011, 16:02

Mgr Grech you cannot stay in denial forever. Even if the Bishops want to direct the politicians on how to think and act, they have no right what so ever to threaten them with eternal condemnation if they do not agree with their directives. There is a big difference between State and Church and you seem to have a problem separating the two. The old gullible audience is long gone, (or maybe in your case not), but you still live in that archaic world of old. You are wrong when you say that people who don't agree with you are wolves hiding in sheep's clothing. People who do not agree with you are people who have realized that they can think for themselves and are able to make up their own minds. So let politicians think for themselves so they can lead this country the best they can without any interference from the Church or anybody else..

j brincat

Sep 11th 2011, 15:13

Hasn't the church done enough damage in the divorce debate?

So why insist? Just to impress!

(jb)

Raymond Sammut

Sep 11th 2011, 13:42

The Roman Catholic Church should get its lot out of Malta, and leave the Maltese people alone. Enough of their self-importance nonsense. This is 2011, not 1500. And no --the Roman Catholic Church has no right whatsoever to exert influence of any kind on Malta's parliament, for that would amount to foreign interference with the affairs of a sovereign state.

Philip Serracino Inglott

Sep 11th 2011, 11:20

Isn't is very cynical for Mgr. Grech to talk of the value of art for bringing people close to God when the church holds on so very tightly to the Intellectual Property of its art? Why is it that so many church owned museums have a policy of 'no photography', and so many church websites reserve every right on their media content? Why is it so hard to get a high resolution image of any of the art works of the Musei Vaticani? Action ought to follow words. In practice the value I've seen the church extract best from the art it holds is monetary! Set your art free, renounce your Intellectual Property rights to it, Mgr. Grech, and your words will start to ring true.

Mr Robert Callus

Sep 11th 2011, 11:16

The problem is with defining the work enrich.

Blackmailing politicians with sin and calling honest Catholics who don't want to impose their religion on others "wolves in sheep's clothing" isn't the perfect definition of enriching, isn't it?

Philip Serracino Inglott

Sep 11th 2011, 11:01

Isn't is very cynical for Mgr. Grech to talk of the value of art for bringing people close to God when the church holds on so very tightly to the Intellectual Property of its art? Why is it that so many church owned museums have a policy of 'no photography', and so many church websites reserve every right on their media content? Why is it so hard to get a high resolution image of any of the art works of the Musei Vaticani? Action ought to follow words. In practice the value I've seen the church extract best from the art it holds is monetary! Set your art free, renounce your Intellectual Property rights to it, Mgr. Grech, and your words will start to ring true.

Roger Tirazona

Sep 11th 2011, 10:41

It’s September the 11th and as usual I put a commemorative facebook status to the ordeal our fellow human beings went through in the Unites States this day ten years ago. My status is all about how the world has changed since then but not completely; because there are still places around the world that are allowing people to dwell in blind faith of the supernatural and in the bigotry that their moral beliefs are absolute and all others false. These are the reasons why highly educated men still found it acceptable to fly a plane into a skyscraper; bigotry, a blind belief in martyrdom and a blind belief in the spiritual values and absolute morality of scriptures outdated by millennia.

I do believe that every person has a right to speak publicly on what are their opinions of what is right and wrong. But there is a chasm of difference between this and having a constitutional monopoly on the morality of a country. Just as there is a big difference between simply speaking on the pulpits against a civil right like divorce and forking out €180,000 Euros to fund a campaign against it; a sum of money of which origins is as obscure as the origins of the scripture this institution so values as its source of morality and which is probably coming from the generosity (or should I say gullibility) of donators whose original noble intention was probably charity. So I am really confused to read about Mgr Grech speaking about the poor.

The most illogical part is this: Coming up with the non sequitur argument that Historical events such as the victory of the great siege and the entry (barely) of supplies from Operation Pedestal happened to coincide with a religious feast is therefore divine intervention and is therefore a permission to tie the church to Political life. How ridiculous.

The church has a right, not to “expose The Truth”, but to speak out “Its truth”. May I remind all the readers of the articles how Catholic Truth has changed over history; a history some people might not want to remind us. Let us remember how catholic truth changed with respect to Science, for which it has asked forgiveness only 400 years after. Let us remember how the Catholic church supported Fascist regimes, even in legal treaties and concordats under Pius XII with the German Nazi party and how it failed to voice its disapproval of the Holocaust. Let us remember how the genocide in Rwanda was preached by Catholic priests from their pulpits and are now in hiding, even though they are sought from the law. Let us also try to empathise with the parents of unbaptized children who for hundreds of years were engulfed by despair believing their children to be lost in a place called Limbo, only to have Josef Ratzinger say it was a load of rubbish in 2007. It was a very real place to those who believed in the words of the Church and who did not have the time to baptize their children…before 2007 of course.

Let us remember 1960’s Malta, still fresh in the minds of many and even fresher the Divorce campaign in Malta and the actions of many believers and representatives of the church during this campaign. These are the dangers of a bigoted faith system of absolute morality given too much power over any other moral system. After all these mistakes and beggings of forgiveness throughout history, how can one have the gall to claim infallibility and being a possessor of “The Truth” with a Capital T?

May I appeal to our “Catholic” politicians that the advancements that have happened to humanity are the achievements of secular laws, the achievements of the age of reason and enlightenment and Western Philosophy that pre-dates and surpasses the Judeo Christian faith. If it were not for people of secular values like Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, The USA would have kept the system of slavery, which the Southern States believed was supported by the morality of the bible. Deus Vindice (God will vindicate us) was the Southern States’ Motto. It is an appeal to all politicians for rational secular thinking while putting personal faith aside when leading the country; if scientists can do it, so can polticians. To impose one’s belief on others is undemocratic, dictatorial thinking worthy of North Korea, not a confessional choice or lay choice.

Mark Anthony Caruana

Sep 11th 2011, 10:27

Historical facts show clearly what happens each time the church tries to 'enrich' politicians with its dogma:

a thousand years ago we had the heroic crusades...

soon after we had the holy inquisition...

in the 1960's: entire families ended up divided due to hatred and political intolerance...

a few months ago we had the divorce issue and we all know what happened... (this time it backfired on the church!)

I think that to err is human, to forgive is divine... but to persist in error is DIABOLIC!!!
as Seneca, a Roman Stoic philosopher, said: "humanum est perseverare diabolicum"

Ramon Casha

Sep 11th 2011, 10:06

"This help, he said, was needed in particular by Catholic politicians who were called to clothe society in the beauty of God through their work."

No they are not.

Elected politicians are called upon to serve their country or locality to the best of their abilities. Whatever their personal beliefs, when performing their duties they are acting not on behalf of the followers of any religious sect, but all of society. It is critically important for people in positions of authority to keep their personal lives and their public duties separate.

There have been instances where authorities refused to marry couples because they had different colour of skin, or same-sex couples were denied access to housing because the clerk in question didn't like the idea of them living together under one roof. All because these people felt that their personal beliefs and feelings could override the rights of others.

Catholic politicians are perfectly free to apply the teachings of the church to their personal lives, and to live to the best of their ability by the instructions of the church. However in executing their duties they are acting for Malta and its people, and this includes those who are not Catholics and have no desire to follow its rules.

William Flynn

Sep 11th 2011, 09:47

Enrich this!
Victory Day has nothing to do with Bambina. The church jhas a feast for each day of the year so it thinks it has the right to demean the sacrifices of our ancestors and our National Day by claiming saintly intervention. What rubbish!
As to the serious subject of the bishop’s insistence to the subject of church and state, NO! The church has NO right to teach, preach, interfere, enrich, guide, lecture (or whatever bishop Grech wishes to call it) politicians. He offends the basic freedom and democratic sensibilities of the vast majority of the country by persevering in his futile efforts to scratch and claw his way back into political influence; the people have shown they want none of it.

Just because he stands in front of a few parishioners and says things like this doesn’t make it a fait accompli. The divorce referendum was a fait accompli.

Politicians don't represent him, except as one individual citizen; and he certainly doesn't represent the politicians. He has as much right to lecture politicians as any Maltese individual person. - but only in his capacity as a civilian NOT as a bishop.

He and his church, and any church or religion for that matter, should be out of the loop. The message has been spelt to him loud and clear. When will bishop Grech understand the word NO? N...O...NO! No confessional has any place in state affairs.

That's the way secularism works. Malta and the Maltese will NOT stand for his ideas or "guidance". This they showed with devastating clarity in the recent referendum.

Until we remove ARTICLE 2 from our Constitution, the bishops will never understand they no longer have the clout they once bluffed us they did.
The bluff was called on 28 May and all they indeed up with was a pair of eights in poker parlance. (It-tnejn qlaw ottu.)

Mr Kevin J Vella

Sep 11th 2011, 09:36

the Church has no claim to temporal power .... remember Bishop. These are modern times and no one really wants to return to the Dark Ages and the Medieval.