The recent letter by William P. Flynn of Victoria, Australia begs a rebuttal. He makes the argument that Malta should amend its Constitution to separate Church and state. He wants to promote secularism in Malta. Let's look at the arguments used by Mr Flynn to propose this amendment to Malta's Constitution.
Without any basis in fact, Mr Flynn claims that "the vast majority of Maltese are not practising Catholics, as evidenced by 365 virtually empty churches". Well I don't know where Mr Flynn got his information from. He obviously is not making this statement based on his personal observations since he lives in Australia. If Mr Flynn wants to make a valid and believable point, he needs to base his stated "facts" on real facts. Mr Flynn did not provide any proof of his claim and therefore his claim is totally invalid.
He also claims that somehow both political parties were intimidated by the Curia to toe the Church's line when the Constitution was drafted. Again, Mr Flynn has not provided any semblance of proof that this happened, apart from his usual rhetoric.
He next attacks the Church by bringing up the scandal of a very small number of priests who had abused children; the Church's teachings against divorce; and finally the Church's campaign against abortion. Mr Flynn may not believe that abortion is the murder of an unborn child or that divorce is against the teachings of Jesus Christ, but many Maltese people do. We have seen many such attacks by Mr Flynn on this paper so we are all aware of his attacks against the Church.
He also quotes the first amendment of the US Constitution, which reads "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". We all know that the US has separation of Church and state, but let us look at the US, which is a very secular state as Mr Flynn knows.
• The US has one of the highest crime rates in the world. It ranks at 24 for murders per capita.
• The US has a very high capital punishment rate. Since capital punishment was reinstated in 1977, 432 people have been executed in the US.
• The US has one of the highest abortion rates in the world. Since abortion was legalised in 1973, over 49 million babies have been aborted.
• The US has a high rate of drug addiction. A 2007 report found drug overdose deaths are now the second leading cause of death in America and that 19.7 million Americans used drugs in a one-month period.
• The US has the highest divorce rate in the world. According to statistics provide by www.divorcerate.org, "50 per cent of all marriages in America end in divorce". This translates into children being brought up in broken families and many in single-parent families.
Even though the US is one of the richest countries in the world, millions of Americans are living in poverty. This in a nation that recently bailed out greedy bankers to the tune of over a trillion dollars while the senior executive members of the same banks gave themselves multi-million dollar bonuses.
Many American families go bankrupt when they are faced with huge health care bills because millions of Americans cannot afford health care coverage.
I could go on and on but I believe that the above clearly shows the state of affairs in the US.
Many Americans pride themselves in the separation of Church and state. This in a nation that has "In God We Trust" printed on its money and invokes the name of God in their national anthem. This is not to say that there aren't millions of Americans who trust in God, but there are many who don't. The US is a great country but the increasing secularism has led to this sorry state of affairs.
This is what Mr Flynn wants the Maltese people to emulate and to fashion their Constitution after.
Well Mr Flynn, thank you but no thank you.