Cardinal Connell explained the concept of mental reservation to the Murphy Child Abuse Inquiry as follows.
Well, the general teaching about mental reservation is that you are not permitted to tell a lie.
On the other hand, you may be put in a position where you have to answer, and there may be circumstances in which you can use an ambiguous expression realising that the person who you are talking to will accept an untrue version of whatever it may be – permitting that to happen, not willing that it happened, that would be lying.
It really is a matter of trying to deal with extraordinarily difficult matters that may arise in social relations where people may ask questions that you simply cannot answer. Everybody knows that this kind of thing is liable to happen.
So, mental reservation is, in a sense, a way of answering without lying.
I’m going to treat this concept with the absolute contempt it deserves. At no point am I going to give it even a smidgen of credibility because to do so would damage my own credibility and insult my intelligence not to mention the intelligence of readers.
Unfortunately, and incredibly, this bizarre and corrupt Catholic teaching has been treated as a matter worthy of discussion by much of the Irish media over the past week or so.
I want to be absolutely clear here – anybody, with even the smallest self respect for themselves or their profession, should have reacted to this corrupt concept with total and absolute derision.
People like Cardinal Connell and Archbishop Martin, both of whom apparently fully accept the corrupt concept as perfectly reasonable and normal, should have been publicly derided when they spoke in defence of this corrupt concept.
I’ve already said that Archbishop Martin is a dishonest, sly defender of an obnoxious religion and a recent interview on the scandal confirms my view (This Week).
This man’s aim is the very same as that of the bishops who decided that the good name of their (corrupt) church was more important than saving children from rape.
Right throughout the interview he dissembles and evades,refusing to make any direct criticism of his church or any of those responsible for putting children in danger.
Asked what should happen to those named in the report Martin replied that they should be given the chance to give their side of the story in the court of public opinion.
The interview is worth quoting at length to demonstrate how far this so called priest is prepared to go to defend his corrupt church.
Do you think that’s satisfactory?
Public opinion can be sharper than the sword of the law.
How is that to be measured?
It will be measured by the way public opinion acts. Public opinion can act in a way that is lynch law or it can act in a way that the citizens of the country are able to express their…
Has the church no mechanism to act?
I don’t have that authority, I think in the past the resignations have come from those who, they resigned.
On mental reservation:
Mental reservation is where you make a declaration and it’s not untrue but you don’t necessarily tell the entire truth. I’m told that this is precisely the mechanism that was used to take the oath of allegiance at the beginning of this state.
On O’Connell’s evidence regarding mental reservation:
He said he cooperated but what he didn’t say was he had cooperated fully.
I saw that, that isn’t mental reservation.
What is it?
That’s being scarce with the truth.
A lie?
A lie, I won’t go into the intention of somebody, it could be a comment that was made afterwards. It was a comment of somebody else on the action of…
Isn’t the idea of mental reservation to give somebody the opportunity to take things up the wrong way?
It is but a sharp investigator should be able to notice those things. (So the victims who approached the liar Connell for help and comfort didn’t have much hope).
Have you used it?
Have you anything to declare? We all use mental reservations.
Was Desmond Connell right to use it in the context in which he used it?
The question there about cooperating fully, I think it was somebody else actually who said that.
(He doesn’t have the courage to simple say that Connell is a liar).
There was a specific example where he used the were and are, it was a difference of tense to avoid telling the full truth. Was it right to use it in that context?
If there was a deliberate attempt to hide the truth it was not right but I can’t judge exactly what was going on in a man’s mind at that stage, it would be unfair to do that.
This is the man who is almost universally praised for his response to the child abuse holocaust. He simply doesn’t have it in him to make any serious criticism of his church or any of the ruthless perverted criminals who populate its ranks.
If Martin was the man he likes to portray himself as he would, after learning the full horror of what had happened, have ripped off his collar and threw it in the gutter.
I agree completely with Richard Dawkins when he says that religious indoctrination amounts to child abuse.
In my opinion Cardinal Connell’s response to the wholesale rape of children stems largely from the psychological damage inflicted on him by religious indoctrination.
Archbishop Martin’s defence of his corrupt church is also an indication of psychological damage caused by religious indoctrination when he was a child.
The only difference between these two men and the terrorists who flew planes into the twin towers is one of degree; both actions resulted in massive suffering to innocent human beings.
It is an absolute certainty that that suffering will continue until such time as the Catholic Church is destroyed.
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