March 7th, 2016

Je Suis Irish Catholic—et Juif Aussi

During the past 40 years or so it has become “totally unacceptable” to our cultural dictators to  criticise any religion or belief system—with one notable exception, which is always fair game. This is well illustrated by a recent blog post by Fr Hunwicke:

 I think I heard yesterday some woman called Libby Purves, on the Home Service [he means BBC Radio 4], utter the phrase “the clammy hand of Irish Catholicism was on her shoulder”.

“The clammy hand of Pakistani Islam was on her shoulder”.
“The clammy hand of Tibetan Buddhism was on his shoulder”.
“The clammy hand of Hampstead Agnosticism was on her shoulder”.
“The clammy hand of Grauniad Liberalism was on his shoulder”.
“The clammy hand of pacifist Quakerism was on her shoulder.”
“The clammy hand of Media Homosexualism was on his shoulder”.
“The clammy hand of the Russian ghettoes was on her shoulder”.
“The clammy hand of a dim BBC chat-show hostess who had come to hate the Catholicism in which she was brought up was on his shoulder”.

I wonder how many of these delightfully flippant formulae would be considered acceptable as obiter dicta on the modern Beeb. Or is there now just one single “identity” which all Sensible People can join in slagging off to their hearts’ content?

If so, then, in the modern fashion, I proclaim Je suis Irish Catholic.

Now I come to think of it, Father is slightly out of date. If you are a lefty university student, it’s recently  become OK to have a go at the Jews. Socialist undergraduates at Oxford, of all  places, now think it’s funny to sing  anti-Semitic  songs. One of their favourites, I understand,  is “Rockets Over Tel-Aviv”. Just like the British Union of Fascists  who used to paint  the sign PJ (Perish Judah) on walls.

Well, the Church is the new Israel, so maybe it’s not such a bad thing for us to suffer humiliation along with our elder brothers, as I believe Pope St John Paul called them.