Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, Archbishop of Westminster
THE IRELAND FUND LUNCHEON : 9th March 2006

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Ladies and Gentlemen:

I am very grateful for the invitation to speak to you today. I had not realised that there would be quite so many here. When I was installed just six years ago as Archbishop of Westminster, there was a huge crowd at Westminster Cathedral and everybody had to have a ticket or there was no hope of getting in. An Irish lady came to the door without a ticket and tried desperately to get in but the ushers were firm: “without a ticket – no entry!” And then she said, “But, look, I have come all the way from Ireland. You must let me in!” So they relented and let her in. I met her afterwards and asked her, “How did you get in without a ticket?” She said, “Well, I said I had come all the way from Ireland – but I did not tell them that was 40 years ago!”

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• Archbishop of Westminster biography > (.pdf 110k)

But let me begin by speaking of an event nearly a year ago. The death of Pope John Paul II and the Election of Pope Benedict XVI took place on a huge world stage. It was unforgettable, not just for those who watched it but especially for those of us that played a part in the events as Cardinal-Electors. I have never been treated with such respect in Rome by the officials of the Vatican and indeed in all of Rome – I suppose they were thinking, “well you never you know, it could be him!” One hundred and fifteen of us went in for the Election in the Sistine Chapel and when the door was finally closed we looked at each other and I thought, ‘Well, one of us is not going to come out of here without carrying a huge burden’. And the voting went on until the 77 – the magic number – of Ratzinger came and when it was reached there was a great clap and the voting then finished. Someone then went up to him and said, ‘Do you accept to become Supreme Pontiff?’ And he said, ‘I accept as the will of God’. And then he was asked what name he would take. And he said straight away: ‘Benedict’.

Later he explained the reasons for his choice of name. One of them was that St. Benedict of Nursia, the father of western monasticism, is one of the Patrons of Europe. Pope Benedict is concerned about Europe: its direction or lack of it; the question of its roots, and what truly nourishes it. And that’s a concern that we, in these islands, need to have more, perhaps, than we do. The Irish in particular, many, many centuries ago, made a huge contribution to the culture of Europe; it helped to form the soul of Europe through its saints and monks and scholars. And that is why today Ireland punches far above its weight in Europe: not just because of its economy, but because of what it represents: a culture with a soul. A nation with a heritage. A tree with deep roots.

What Pope Benedict is concerned about is that Europe will neglect and ignore that heritage, that it is trying to deny the roots, as it were, while enjoying the fruits. This became particularly apparent in the drafting of the preamble of the recent European Constitution. In the Constitution itself, the Church as a body was recognised, and its rights respected; but in the preamble, which tried to summarise what Europe stood for, it passed directly from the Greeks and the Romans to the Enlightenment, as if what was in between was embarrassing or irrelevant. This was not just prejudice but historical amnesia: it made no scientific sense! For almost everything that we modern Europeans value, and which makes Europe so exceptional – our respect for human rights, our legal traditions, the balance of powers, the concern for the poor – is precisely the fruit of centuries of a community in relationship with God. Where else do human rights stem from, than from the knowledge that God created us, and therefore the value of our lives cannot be determined by the state, or by others, but must be respected by them?

Many Europeans have convinced themselves that to be modern and free, they must be radically secular, autonomous, self-sufficient. The individual is happiest when most free - when he or she is unshackled by constraints of tradition and institutions. This idea has been taken up the state, and by the intellectual and cultural elite, so that a contrary view is often subject to ridicule or hostility. This is what Pope Benedict meant when he spoke, just before his election, of “the dictatorship of relativism” in Europe. It’s not that the Pope does not realise that there are many different religious and cultural and intellectual traditions co-existing in Europe. The Pope believes in tolerance and dialogue. But he is not a relativist. He fiercely opposes the idea that because there are different versions of truth that therefore there is no truth, or worse, that the truth has to be whatever each person declares it to be. The dictatorship of relativism is the imposition of this idea that there is no such thing as common or shared values; that human beings cannot seek the truth together. The dictatorship of relativism undermines not just religion. It undermines the idea of culture and family and association.

Pope Benedict is alarmed by this, because he knows that the deepest currents of history are not fundamentally political or economic but spiritual and cultural. He knows this from the history of Europe and, in particular, the history of his own Germany and from his association with Pope John Paul. Poland survived as a nation, not because of economics or politics - it was written out of the map of Europe for one hundred and fifty years - but by its culture; by its faith; by its dogged clinging to an interior reality, beyond the reach of the state, which was what really made Poland. The history of Ireland has much that demonstrates this too. A nation is ultimately shaped not by ideology, and not by the free market –ideologies come and go; economies rise and fall – but by what people honour and cherish and worship; by what society deems to be true and good. That is its rock; everything else is like the shifting sands on a beach.

I say all this because it seems to me that we who live in this strongly secular society have got to be aware that economic wealth and democracy are not the only things which drive history or drive society, and we neglect this fact at our peril. It is very interesting that Tony Blair asked me to make sure that Faith Schools flourish, as indeed they do, whether they are Roman Catholic or Church of England. They are, overall, better than other schools; they are popular schools, which parents want for their children because they realise that in them are values, and discipline, and human compassion. But does the Government want faith schools to thrive because they recognise what drives those schools – or for purely utilitarian reasons? The Government’s proposed education reforms are interesting and challenging, and there is much that is good in them. But running through them is a utilitarian ethos, which we have to be on our guard against. The danger is that we try to have the fruits without looking after the roots. It is the treasure we must value, not the fragile earthenware pot which carries it.

I think Ireland has a special role in this, our new Europe, as one of the guardians of its soul. It has a special role to play in reminding Europe of the need to cherish the roots. I don’t mean that Ireland is necessarily fulfilling that role; in many ways Ireland at the moment is part of the culture of forgetting those roots. But Ireland has a mission, a vocation, which sooner or later it must return to in order to be truly itself.

So I want to congratulate you today because by your presence here you show that you care about the treasure. The people of Israel were formed out of the covenant with God; and Europe was formed by the parables of the lost sheep and the Good Samaritan. We create bonds, we learn to belong to each other, not by ties of kith and kin, important as these are, but by creating neighbours of the least fortunate through assisting them. That is the glue that binds us together: God searches for us, forgives us, cares for us; and we, in response, reach out to others in charity and compassion, and so form a nation, a culture, a community.

Through the Ireland Fund you show that you care about the needs of those who are less well off and are willing to sacrifice yourselves for them. You are honouring and cherishing what is true and what is good and what is important. You are forging our true bonds, the bonds without which we all perish. Your contributions will not just make a difference to people’s lives in a very direct way, but will enhance all our lives by shoring up the true roots of our European civilisation.
Thank you very much.