Céide and Cardinal Connell

CÉIDE AND CARDINAL CONNELL

by PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

CÉIDE is a disingenuous magazine.  It has adopted the motto Doras Feasa Fiafraighe which it translates as "The door to knowledge is questioning".  Fiafraighe is more accurately translated as "asking" rather than "questioning".

Anyway, the Céide people are not good questioners.  For example, while they insist upon questioning every aspect of Catholicism which readers of The Brandsma Review accept, why are they so confident about the fruits of the Second Vatican Council?

Why can they not see the irony of calling Céide a "review from the margins" while touting articles by such establishment figures as Garrett FitzGerald, Michael D. Higgins and Mary Robinson (who all have more than their share of questionable actions - unquestioned by an uninquisitive media)?  Why do they accept the media's assertion that journalists, both print and broadcast, do not form but reflect public opinion?

To digress from religion for a moment: consider the recent revelations about the 1970s Arms Trial.  Captain James Kelly has been referred to on the airwaves as the Dreyfus of modern Irish history and is guarranteed a more favourable reception than hitherto.  (It is true that a terrible injustice was done to him - and now that he is "politically correct" how many new supporters will gather round him?).

But is anyone going to sit down and analyse the media presentation of the political protagonists in the intervening years: Messrs. Lynch, Gibbons, O'Malley, Haughey and Blaney?  Céide correspondent Dr FitzGerald got away with referring to Mr Haughey's "flawed pedigree" in Dáil Éireann in 1979, by which he meant the arms trials rather than the more recent allegations of corruption.

Remember how bright the Progressive Democrats were painted in 1985, about two and a half years before they proposed their Godless Constitution on Trinity Sunday of 1988?  But I am not dwelling on the political vagaries of the last 31 years, only the media's assertions about itself that Céide has no trouble accepting.

I would have thought Dr FitzGerald should be ashamed to comment on Ireland's birthrate, as he does in the April/May Céide.  His 1982-1987 coalition closed Carysfort College, confident there would soon be a shortage of primary school children (Family Planning [Amendment] Act, 1985?).   They got it badly wrong: this is a severe shortage of primary teachers now.

Forgive my brief partisan digression.

Knack of opening doors

Céide has a problem with Cardinal Connell.  I must confess I had a good gloat over the commentary by  Fathers Hegarty, Hoban and other anonymous sources sitting at the feet of  Rev Michael Enda McDonagh - in quick succession Professor of Moral Theology in Maynooth; chaplain to Mary Robinson in the Park; and President of the People's Democratic Union of Priests.  Can anyone tell me what Father McDonagh's handshake is like?  I would love to know.  He seems capable of opening so many doors - though his friend Dr FitzGerald failed to talk Monsignor Alibrandi into moving him into a big house in Tuam in the 1980s.

It is funny that these middle-aged established clerics were so shocked at the advent of  a bright young orthodox priest called Fr David O'Hanlon, who was caricatured in Céide's commentary.  (Hang out with Father David for too long and you won't be invited to suburban middle class semi-ds by non-practicing 30-somethings for Chablis and Brie).  Well, they seem to find the septuagenarian cardinal as threatening as the notorious trigintarian curate.

They are hurting

They don't quite say that Cardinal Connell should not have got the red hat.  But they are terribly hurt on behalf of liberal Irish Catholics and Protestant churchmen (who, Father Hegarty tells us, are also disciples.)  Dominus Iesus and intercommunion are the stumbling blocks in regard to the latter.

I have already stated Céide's mantra "Vatican II" (Has anyone analysed this 36-year old fundamentalism - the cult of the Spirit-of-Vatican II?).  So would it come to a surprise to them that Dominus Iesus might be a rehash of Dignatatus Humanae, the Declaration of Religious Liberty?  Dominus Iesus is founded on the conciliar documents as it is written - not on what a manipulative intelligentsia, both ecclesiastical and secular has duped the tea-and-biscuit ecumenists into thinking it says.

Traditionalists have heard endless debates about the use of the Latin verb subsistere (which doesn't quite mean "to subsist") in regard to the Church of Christ in the visible Catholic Church.  This led to a reaction against the document on the council floor.  Dominus Iesus now apologetically uses the same verb, and largely repeats what was stated.  Although it has been denounced as heresy by extreme Dominican supporters of the Society of St Pius X in Avrillé, the greatest opponents of the new document are those who purport to be loyal adherents to its mother-document.

Archbishop Wojtyla, who was influential in the debate on religious liberty at the Council and the framing of the Declaration, is now portrayed as the reactionary pontiff who tenaciously holds on to life.  Rev Professor Joseph Ratzinger, friend of Rahner and Küng, is now the Grand Inquisitor of a reformation tract.  And Dominus Iesus is open to vilification.  One cannot help but question the leadership of the Pontifical Council Promoting Christian Unity, since the time of Cardinal Bea.  So is it really a case of Bea culpa, Bea culpa, Bea maxima culpa?
Shooting the messenger
Monsignor Desmond Connell, Archbishop of Dublin and Primate of Ireland, defends the document.  This earns him the ire of liberals, who prefer the Second Vatican Council the way they imagined it rather than the way it was.  Rev Patrick Jones of the National Liturgy Centre must find this every time some erudite lay observer reminds him that Sacrosanctum Concilium did not mandate the gutting of church sanctuaries, and can quote the document.  It goes a lot further than church architecture: eg, it states that Latin should remain the language of the Mass; and that Gregorian chant should be the norm for sung Masses.

And there are more where that came from.  The Council Documents also ask priests and religious to continue wearing a distinctive mode of dress.  The Second Vatican Council did not, or could not, accept the reformed sects as "sister churches" and neither does Dominus Iesus.  Cardinal Connell states this, and the liberal approach is to shoot the messenger.  But that is to be expected from a clergy who are quite used to twisting their presentation of the faith to suit themselves.
Orthodox on intercommunion
As for intercommunion, ecumenism and ecumania - I lament we do not have a larger Eastern Orthodox community in this country.  In that case, ecumenism would have a more balanced focus.  I would relish seeing well-heeled liberal Catholics refused communion by bearded archimandrites at the iconostasis.

Over a decade ago, a delegation from the Russian Church (before the fall of the Soviet Union) visited Maynooth.  An ill-informed deacon offered the Metropolitan of Odessa the chalice at Mass.  The Metropolitan refused.  This has not entered the lore of intercommunion on these islands.  So when Archbishop Connell offends a number of religiously illiterate bourgeois housewives in BASIC who socialise with The Irish Times' Patsy McGarry (who also contributes to Céide), he gets vilified.  And Father Hegarty sees Dr Connell's new red biretta as giving

little hope to Irish Catholic liberals who need leadership

Don't they have the media to lead them where they want to go?
Left losing support
Céide also names Father Vincent Twomey SVD, lecturer in Moral Theology in Maynooth as Connell's ultimate successor.  As I have no access to their crystal ball, I will not comment.  Fr Twomey studied under Ratzinger at Regensburg in the late 1960s, after the future Cardinal moved away from the jet-setting theologians who founded Concilium.

Céide's main source of information on Father Twomey is John Allen's new biography of Cardinal Ratzinger.  John Allen is a correspondent with the American National Catholic Reporter.  This has been the flagship periodical of the American Catholic left since the Second Vatican Council.  It has been losing steam for some time recently, as it has noticed that the younger generation  of American Catholics is either leaving the Church altogether (often to become Eastern Orthodox or evangelical protestants) or going to conservative, traditionalist or eastern Catholic movements.  The United States Catholic left, hard and soft, is losing support.  Would Céide profit by their example?
Swipe at St Thérèse
Céide have some solutions of their own.  They suggested that when Jim Cantwell retired from the Catholic Press and Information Office, he be replaced by a bright young woman like Annette O'Donnell.  Do they seriously believe that perception is everything?  I think they seriously need to question the media.  And they also propose Father John O'Donoghue as the perfect candidate to translate the Church's spiritual treasury into the language of the unchurched young (this is my terminology).  Father O'Donoghue did not even identify himself as a priest in Anamchara, which was a highly questionable work anyway.

Father Hoban denigrates alternatives to Anamchara, such as trips to Medjugorje and tours of boxes of relics (a swipe at St Thérèse of Lisieux).  In the first instance, the Medjurgorje phenonomen has not been (and is unlikely to be) authenticated by the Church, and pilgrimages there are private affairs.  And the tour of St Thérèse's relics is based on an initiative of the laity - not the hierarchy, not the clergy and not the religious.
Spiritual bankruptcy
This is something that Father Hoban should reflect upon: the paternalistic liberals dominating the Irish clergy do not seem to accept the fact that the most dedicated among the laity now have a different vision to them.  Has the faith they once possessed deserted them so completely that they react against anything tainted by traditional Catholicism - even though, in the majority of instances, this does not in fact come from traditionalists?

Do they not see that the apparitions and the prayer-groups and the new devotions are born out of the spiritual and sacramental bankruptcy of many pastoral settings?  The present state of affairs  has its origin in a false reading of the Second Vatican Council.  Céide follows The National Catholic Reporter in this respect.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 54, May-June 2001

Mgr Cremin and the Revolution

MGR CREMIN AND THE REVOLUTION

by PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

Beatus servus quem, cum venerit dominus, invenerit vigilantum - St Matthew, 24:26

DR NOEL BROWNE had a theological advisor.  In his memoirs Against the Tide he outlined the advice he received regarding his Mother and Child Scheme.  The hierarchy were confusing the area of social teaching with moral teaching and reacted incorrectly.  But the advisor was unnamed until the publication of John Horgan's recent biography of Dr Browne.  It was the late Monsignor Patrick Francis Cremin, P.A., S.T.D, J.U.D.

Mgr Cremin was born in Kerry on October 10, 1910.  He had a brilliant student career in Killarney and Maynooth, as well as distinguishing himself as a hurler.  He spent two years in Rome, remarkably achieving two doctorates, one of which was the Juris Utriusque Doctor - Doctor of both Civil and Canon Law. (He was one of only three JUDs who taught at Maynooth since 1795).  He became Professor of Moral and Dogmatic Theology in the Pontifical University, Maynooth on his 29th birthday and in 1949, Professor of Canon Law.  He was Librarian of Maynooth between 1939 and 1946.

One priest said, perhaps in reference to Dr Cremin's prowess with the camán in minor and major seminary, that Frank Cremin occupied the same position on the pitch as ever, but the goalposts were moved so much that he went from the centre to the extreme right.

Resident reactionary pariah

Well, what brought an adviser to the socialist Minister for Health in the 1948-51 Government to become regarded as Maynooth's resident reactionary pariah in the 1980s and1990s?

In 1962, the bishops went to Rome to Pope John's Council.  There was a question whether Professor Cremin would accompany them; most bishops thought not.  The Archbishop of Dublin, Dr McQuaid, brought Dr Cremin as a peritus.  In the course of the council, Francis Cremin debated with other periti - notably Professor Hans Küng - and he worked on Christus Dominus, the Decree on the Bishop's Pastoral Office in the Church, a key document in dealing with the controversial issue of collegiality.

It might be said that few Irishmen has as much insight into the Second Vatican Council as Father Cremin.  But this did not mean preferment.  In 1966, Mgr Mitchell stepped down as President of Maynooth to become parish priest of Ballinrobe.  Fr Cremin was the senior academic in Maynooth and Dean of the Faculty of Canon Law.  The Professor of Ecclesiastical History, Fr Corish, succeeded Mgr Mitchell and he in turn was succeeded by Fr Jeremiah Newman, Professor of Catholic Action and Sociology.  Among other things, Fr Newman was active in promoting the admission of lay students to Maynooth in 1966.  In his capacity as a sociologist, he also spent sometime living in a hippie commune in California.
A job well done
History is written by the victors.  Humanae Vitae was promulgated in 1968 and the Irish hierarchy asked Father Cremin to present it to the Irish media.  Television viewers watched Dr Cremin declare:

There you have it, gentlemen - no change.

To read David Quinn's piece in The Irish Catholic marking the 30th anniversary of Humanae Vitae, one would think the press conference was a disaster.  Immediately after the conference, Professor Cremin asked Archbishop McQuaid's press officer for an appraisal of how he handled the media, and was told he did very well.

It seems controversy developed afterwards when a would-be Labour TD named Conor Cruise-O'Brien initiated a protracted correspondence on the subject in The Irish Times.  But how in tune with Irish public opinion was Dr Cruise-O'Brien at the time?

Leaving aside the antics of Mrs Robinson, Mary Kenny and others on a train from Belfast in the 1970s, the criminalisation of contraception was found to be unconstitutional in the Magee judgement in 1973, thanks to the "emanation of a penumbra" school of jurisprudence, enabling the Supreme Court to discover a "right to marital privacy" in de Valera's constitution.  So the then Fine Gael liberal, Patrick Cooney, attempted to legislate on the matter in 1975.  After a debate, during which the former Fianna Fáil Justice Minister Desmond O'Malley referred to Mr Cooney's Bill as a "licence to fornicate" (I am not making this up), Dáil  Éireann was startled to see An Taoiseach, Liam MacCosgair and several Fine Gael TDs walking through the Níl lobby with Fianna Fáil.

In 1979, Charles Haughey was Minister for Health and Social Welfare and he introduced his Family Planning Bill.  At the time, the Bill was opposed by a majority of voters in Deputy Haughey's constituency.  Mr Haughey's Act has been described as an Irish solution to an Irish problem, as if Serbo-Croatian solutions to Irish problems are somehow more desirable.  This allowed contraceptives on to the statute books for the first time since their ban in the 1920s.  It was a decisive factor in bringing Pope John Paul II to Ireland on his third foreign trip.
Lengthy transition
This was the law until Dr FitzGerald and Mr Desmond decided otherwise in 1985.  I was outside Leinster House the day Mr Desmond's Bill was debated in the Oireachtas.  The climate outside was palpable.  Most of the people of Ireland did not want this Bill passed.  Mr O'Malley was again on the opposition benches and this time he just couldn't make up his mind, so he abstained.  At the division, 83 voted Tá, 80 Níl, with two abstentions - largely a result of the imposition of a three-line whip.  This was before the red herring of AIDS was introduced into the equation.

A few years later, Deputy Haughey was Taoiseach and Deputy O'Malley, now leader of the Progressive Democrats, was in his cabinet and AIDS was seen as a burning issue.  Mr O'Malley assured the Taoiseach of his party's support for a further relaxation of Mr Desmond's Act.  He found that half his party had problems with his liberal stance on the issue - but all this evaporated a few years later when Brendan Howlin succeed Dr John O'Connell as Minister for Health in 1992.  It took Ireland nearly a quarter of a century after Humanae Vitae to embrace the contraceptive mentality.  And this transition did not come easily.  For this reason, I cannot conclude that the 1968 launch of Humanae Vitae was a disaster.
Pipped by Casey
Following the press conference, Fr Cremin had other battles.  He was passed over for the episcopacy - notably when Fr Éamonn Casey was made Bishop of Kerry.  His Eminence William Cardinal Conway told Mgr Casey that it had taken him four years to convince the Congregation of Bishops that he was a better choice than Dr Cremin.  Dr Cremin got the title Monsignor as a consolation prize.

Some rebel seminarists in Maynooth demanded a course on sexual ethics.  Mgr Cremin agreed, on the condition he could deliver the course in a language of his choice.  Henceforth the lectures and examinations on the subject were exclusively in Latin.  But Maynooth had taken a turn for the worse and Mgr Cremin discovered he had to explain matters to Third Divinity students on topics they should have covered in First Divinity, and later, even things that should have been dealt with in school catechesis.

In the late 1970s, he had a series of four articles published in the Irish Independent entitled "What's Wrong with Maynooth?"  This was principally an appeal to the hierarchy to do something.   The one active element of his career was to assist in the drafting of the 1983 Codex Iuris Canonici, with the special reference to the section on the canon law of marriage.  In 1998, he was made a Protonotary Apostolic.
Lonely retirement
Mgr Cremin's years following his retirement were lonely.  A whole folklore about him developed in the college that was quite inconsistent with reality.  Clerical students were not encouraged to make a habit of speaking with him, and those who did were rewarded with a reprimand.  He did not say the Tridentine Mass, nor even the Novus Ordo in Latin.  He said the Novus Ordo Mass in English in the Lady Chapel in Maynooth College Chapel, using Roman vestments and strictly adhering to the rubrics - and he said the Roman canon in a low voice.  On one occasion, I served his Mass and reminded myself that the celebrant of the Novus Ordo Mass used water only for the post communion purifications and not wine, as in the old Mass.  So I was suprised when he requested wine.  He said Mass versus Dominum until the altar in the Lady Chapel was taken back.

He was incredibly well informed about the current situation in the Church.  He believed this current crisis to be worse than the Reformation and that the situation was beyond human redemption.  He was confident of a glorious revival, though not in his own lifetime.  He continued to maintain a broad focus on the world, reading several newspapers regularly, and I remember during a spate of industrial action, his response was to say we neglected the encyclicals on social justice at our peril.
Deeper problems
At a more local level, he was critical of the Maynooth authorities' sudden hardening of attitude towards domestic staff in the early 1990s (until then, domestic staff were treated in a manner consistent with Catholic social teaching rather than with contemporary business practice).  He retained his interest in sport, but regarded the disproportionate reaction to Ireland's soccer successes in 1988, 1990 and 1994 as symptomatic of deeper problems.

In 1999, he moved out of Maynooth when the college authorities closed the infirmary.  This meant that, as his health was deteriorating, he could not rely on medical care as hitherto.  Care for retired academic staff was no longer a priority at St Patrick's College, Maynooth.  On November 1, 2001 he died in a nursing home in Tralee.

Requiem aeternum dona ei, Domine, et lux perpetuae luceat ei.  Anima ejus, et animae omnium fidelium defunctorum, per misericordiam Dei, requiescant in pace.  Amen.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 59, March-April 2002  

Two cheers for Father Twomey

Book Review

TWO CHEERS FOR FATHER TWOMEY

by PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

THE END OF IRISH CATHOLICISM?

By Fr Vincent Twomey SVD.  Veritas, Dublin, 2002. 220pp.  €12.95

MY friend, An tAthair Dáibhéad Ua hAnluain, will not mind me citing O'Hanlon's Law.  This states that no Irish Catholic cleric can abide the presence of anyone ideologically to his right.

For this reason, the Catholic Left do their utmost to cultivate the secular Left, who have as little time for former Céide readers as they do for those who read this Review.  The conservative Catholics try to attract liberal Catholics by excluding traditionalists, though the liberals make no distinction between the two.  (It will be interesting to see how the Irish Catholic develops under its new editor.)  And Father Vincent Twomey writes a new book.

I have a certain regard for Rev Dr Vincent Twomey.  For many years, he has been one of the few orthodox paragons in the Pontifical University, Maynooth's theology faculty.  It could not have been so comfortable to work in a moral theology department in which both Rev Enda McDonagh and Rev Patrick Hannon were professors.

For the gossip of many ill-informed (usually lay) theology undergraduates, one might think that Fr Twomey is an arch-conservative reactionary occupying a position of the politico-religious spectrum only slightly to the left of Mère Angelique Arnaud.  And to confirm their analysis, they invariably remind us of the professor under whom he studied at Münster and Regensburg: Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger.

Contrast with Bavaria

For these reasons, I read Fr Twomey's book with interest.  At first I had much to agree with in the opening pages.  Like Fr Twomey, I first realised how devastating the effects of the penal laws were on Ireland while in Catholic Germany.  So many aspects of what Bavarians take for granted are missing from Irish Catholic life: gilded roccoco churches; mediaeval wayside shrines; images of Christ and the Madonna on public display from private houses; observance of Advent; crucifixes hanging in civil service offices; and public holidays on holydays of obligation.

Fr Twomey is particularly interested in this last point.  He contrasts Bavaria, where Ascension Thursday and Corpus Christi are holidays, with Ireland, where the bishops apologetically moved the observance of these feasts to the following Sunday.  This move was intended to woo the lapsed.  As with similar gestures, it did not bring anybody back, but infuriated the faithful.  It occasioned the greatest intake of protest letters that David Quinn received during his editorship of the Irish Catholic.

The comparison is there.  Bavaria (whose relationship with Protestant Prussia resembles our own with Protestant England) has a much more self-confident public Catholicism than Ireland.  And despite the stereotype of the German, Bavaria has more in common with Mediterranean Catholicism than Ireland has.  (I have a thesis that Ireland, Bavaria, Quebec, the southern Netherlands and possibly Lithuania have the common experience of strong regional Catholic identity in the face of persecution by Protestant or Orthodox power.)

Folk festivals

Fr Twomey also points to the folk festivals in Southern Europe on Church holidays.  It should be noted that post-Penal Law Ireland retains one distinctive folk festival - Hallowe'en.  But the Eve of All Hallows has lost  its intimate connexion with the Feasts of All Saints and All Souls.  In Ireland, there seems to be a Calvinist-like obsession with purifying Catholicism of allegedly pagan elements.

Fr Twomey then analyses the present state of the Irish Church in the light of recent historic events.  If I were to caricature this assessment, it would run like this: the Irish Church never took theology seriously and therefore misunderstood the spirit of the Second Vatican Council and implemented it improperly, causing major problems.  And now, the administrators of the Irish Church are shocked into a state of inertia and are unsure of what to do next.

He may have a point, but he should first look at those countries that did take theology seriously.  I am reminded of the Rhine-basin countries referred to in The Rhine Flows into the Tiber.  All these took theology very seriously indeed and all have deeper problems than the Irish Church.

Developments ignored

One of the most positive moves by an episcopal conference I can recall is the Lithuanian bishops' decision to educate all their seminarists in Lithuania, only sending select priests for further study in Rome.  This is not an option for any Irish bishop, unless he has the courage to do as Cardinal Pell has done in Australia, or as Mgr Bruskewitz has done in the United States. (That is, to take personal charge of seminary education and stand no nonsense from dissenting professors.)

But the conservative and traditional lay movements in continental Europe, and moves by the likes of Cardinal Pell and the Lithuanian bishops, and the many positive developments in North American frequently discussed in this Review are not factors in Fr Twomey's thesis.

What Fr Twomey does propose is a radical re-drawing of ecclesiastical boundaries, reducing the number of dioceses and parishes.  This, he argues, will free many priests from administrative duties for pastoral endeavours.

This may well be true, but the scheme is problematic.  The constitution of the Irish dioceses was effected mainly in the 12th Century.  The prelates who oversaw this were saints and scholars under the leadership of St Malachy of Armagh.  It is difficult to see a committee drawn from Ireland's current clergy and bishops (or religious and laity) coming up with something better, should they indulge in a moment of neo-Josephism.

It is true that Irish dioceses are very small and the current vocations crisis will result in a shortage of worthy candidates for the episcopacy in the future (some might say this has already happened).  Prevailing factors may bring about this redrawing of ecclesiastical maps anyway, but I am not without hope that the situation will turn around.  In the circumstances, I disagree with Fr Twomey's prescription for the present.

Weak on catechetics

On the whole, I find Fr Twomey's presentation full of good intentions.  The trouble is that he is unwilling to contaminate himself with the religious Right, preferring (futile) conciliation with the Left.  So the Brandsma Review is unmentioned in the book, in spite of the fact that our readers have a natural sympathy for Fr Twomey.

It is a tragedy that he seems to have missed Éanna Johnson's dissection of the Alive-O series.  Fr Twomey is aware of concern about primary catechesis, but he is reluctant to probe the area.  This reluctance seems like a fudge.

He is vaguely more positive about secondary catechesis, but this affirms the effectiveness of the Maynooth BATh programme he teaches.  In my experience, not only is secondary catechesis negligible, but most informed laypeople under 40 became so by setting aside a lot of their spare time for personal homework.

On political matters, he proffers a pathetic excuse about clergy and laity who knew "in their heart of hearts" that the liberal agenda was wrong, but did not feel competent to enter the debate.  Does this mean that divorce, among other things, was legalised because a considerable number of Irish Catholics were afraid of their own shadows.

I note that Mgr Francis Cremin is conspicuous by his absence.  But the article in the Irish Catholic that described the launch of Humanae Vitae - in which Mgr Cremin played a leading role - as a public relations disaster is reprinted in the book as an appendix.  I wonder if Fr Twomey is hoping to woo those who take this line.  If so, he will fail.
Confidence unjustified
Another disappointment is that Fr Twomey doesn't reflect his former teacher's support for the traditional movement.  Cardinal Ratzinger has been very supportive of new orders such as the Priestly Fraternity of St Peter and lay movements like Una Voce International.  Nor does Fr Twomey note the vitality of Eastern Catholicism - even with the presence of a very active new Byzantine Catholic parish in Dublin.

He prefers to confine his praise to groups which are conservative on faith and morals, but liberal on liturgy, spirituality and general approach.  I would contend that experience of this grotesque age simply does not justify the confidence in modernity displayed by the non-traditionalist neo-conservative movements.

One certainly sympathises with Fr Twomey's endeavours.  It was very brave of an individual priest to produce a work like this in the current ecclesiastical climate.  But one could wish he could bring himself one step closer to the Right.

The Left wrote him off a long time ago.  And those of us on his right really aren't all that odious.  I wonder does O'Hanlon's Law apply outside Ireland.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 69, November-December 2003

An Bíobla Naofa: The First Catholic Bible in Irish

AN BÍOBLA NAOFA: THE FIRST CATHOLIC BIBLE IN IRISH
By JOHN HENEGHAN

ACOMMITTEE WAS established in 1945 to make an Irish version of the New Testament available. Seán Ó Floinn, Éamonn Kissane and Donnchadh Ó Floinn were on that committee. Donnchadh Ó Floinn was responsible for the translation through the 1950s particularly Mark 1-8. Pádraig Ó Fiannachta and Tómas Ó Fiaich guided Luke through the printing stage. Pádraig Ó Fiannachta, Colmán Ó Huallacháin OFM and Tómas Ó Fiaich were appointed to the Committee in 1966.

John was published in Irisleabhar Má Nuad in 1962 and most of the other books were published under the imprint of An Sagart. The basic Hebrew version was used to make the books available. The Jerome Biblical Commentary, and Peakes’ International Commentary were used as these were books with expert knowledge on the bible and they assisted the research that the scholars were undertaking.

Pádraig Ó Fiannachta hadn’t much regard for the English version of the Jerusalem Bible and he didn’t use the King James version either.

The only influence of Bedell (the older Protestant translation of the Bible into Irish) was to be found in the translation work of Joseph Duffy (later Bishop of Clogher). Padraig Ó Fiannachta made sure that each translator was assisted by a bible scholar with an L.S.S. as a basic qualification.
The Advisors
Pádraig Ó Nualláin OCSO: Tobit, Ecclesiastes, the Minor Prophets except Obadiah. He also did Hebrews.
Father Colmcille OCSO: The Psalms.  Máirtín Mac Conmara MSC wrote the forward to these.
Seán de hÍde SJ: Song of Songs.
Gearóid Ó Meachair: Forward to the Prophets.
Brendan Devlin: Isaiah.
Joseph Duffy: Ezechiel
Aibhistín Valkenburg OP: Jeremiah with the forward dedicated to Bedel.
Seán Mac Cárthaigh: Acts of the Apostles and Pauline letters except Hebrews.
Tomás Mac Aodha: 1-3 John.
Pádraig Ó Fiannachta translated : Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1-2 Samuel, 1-2 Kings, 1-2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Job, Proverbs, Sirach, and Mark cc. 9-16, John, James, 1-2 Peter, Jude, Apocalypse.
Seán Ó Caoinleáin advised Pádraig Ó Fiannachta with the Catholic Letters.

It was Caoimhín Ó Condúin C.M., who was an advisor to Padraig Ó Fiananchta to validate his own work. He was an advisor for Pentateuch, John and the Apocalypse. He had Father Dónall Ó Conchúir for the historical books as well as the information that is in the prefaces to the for the Wisdom books except the Psalms. Ó Fiannachta was also responsible for the Irish language in the General Introduction. He translated some of the introductions too because not everyone had good Irish.

He made an effort to ensure that the language was standardised and consistent throughout the work that started with the De Bhaldraithe Dictionary and reached its climax in 1977 with the Ó Dómhnaill Dictionary. Pádraig Ó Fiannachta was in correspondence with Muiris Ó Droighneáin about the standardisation also on a regular basis.
The other Advisors
Donald Ó Conchúir.
Sean Ó Caoinleáin.
Wilfrid Harrington OP.
Some other scholars were invited to make recommendations to the text as amendments:
Seán Mac Riabhaigh.
Pádraig Ó Nualláin OCSO.
Liam Leader.
Morgan Ó Curráin MSC.
Maolmhuire Ó Fiaich CSSp.

By 1977 there was an Irish version of each book published. Pádraig Ó Fiannachta got a grant from an Irish American Cultural Organisation through Cardinal Ó Fiaich to supply a single volume of the books. He promised do this within three years, he got two copies of each text as a heap of foolscap pages and he attached the text in the middle of the pages, he corrected them, he standardised them with help from other scholars, Muiris Ó Droighneáin particularly.  Then he prepared the text for the printer and went to the printer with IR£14,000 with paper which was bought from Clondalkin Paper Mills that were about to close but that were kept open for a extra few days.

There is a huge tea box in the Museum in Maynooth in which is the copy prepared for the printer and the various proof readings are there. The Bible was printed, bound ready within three years—27 months to be precise. Cardinal Ó Fiaich praised Padraig Ó Fiannachta’s work highly in the preface. It was accepted by the Church of Ireland as an authentic text and Archbishop Caird launched the second edition. A pocket edition was published after that and then it was published on CD-Rom in 1998. Pádraig Ó Fiannachta gave a chance to each of the scholars to read their work in proof format before submitting the final proofed version. He also dealt with the main business selling and commercial business arising from the bible
The Methodology and Analysis
As Pádraig Ó Fiannachta was the main worker on the translation, St John’s Gospel will be examined in detail, as he translated this himself. I chose this method as I don’t have Greek or Hebrew and as I am not a biblical scholar. Pádraig Ó Fiannachta himself recommended the Revised Standard Version (RSV) to me.

Ó Fiannachta adhers to the official standard for the most part; it is a style that is compact and precise that can be seen in it:

Thug Eoin freagra orthu. Déanaim féin baiste le huisce ar seisean ‘ach tá duine in bhur measc nach aithnid daoibh’ an té atá ag teacht i mo dhiaidh, nach fiú mé iall a chuaráin a scaoileadh (John 1: 26-27, An Bíobla Naofa, p. 1075).

The same style is adhered to throughout:

Tá an uair ag teacht—tá sí ann cheana nuair a chluinfidh na mairbh glór Mhac Dé agus iad seo a chluinfidh mairfidh siad. (John 5: 25, ibid. p. 1080)

If Ó Fiananchta’s version is compared to the RSV, some similariites and differences can be seen between them. In the English version the same concise style can be seen, but, as it was published in 1952, the English is somewhat archaic. In addition there are more notes at the foot of the pages in the English one, illustrating where the same stories can be found in the other Gospel stories. An example in critical thinking in biblical research is that of the woman accused of committing adultery which is found in the Irish Bible but is not found except as a footnote in the RSV:
John Eight

They went each to his own house, but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Early in the morning he came again to the Temple. The Scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery and placing her in the midst they said to him…(John 7: 53-8: 4, RSV)

This was done in the light of the most recent research because the Church at the time wished to deemphasise the merciful Jesus in return to the original scriptural sense—the mercy of God was stressed in the 19th Devotional Revolution in reaction to the Jansenist heresy which all but omitted it. The Irish Bible was published as is known after the Second Vatican Council. In general, the Ó Fiannachta style follows the normal custom of bibles. It must be remembered that Pádraig Ó Fiannachta based his translation on the basic Hebrew version and also on the Greek version. It is an excellent effort and the talents of the translator must be praised.

John Heneghan (also Seán Ó hÉanacháin) has higher degrees in Modern Irish and extensive experience in second and third level Irish language education.  He lectures in the Training College of An Garda Síochána (the Irish national police academy) and also works for the force as a certified legal translator.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 128, September-October 2013