Sometime ago I had what we call in N. Ireland a “mixed marriage”.
It was not the marriage of a black person to a white person.
It was much worse in N. Ireland terms.
It was the marriage of a Roman Catholic woman to a divorced Protestant man who happened to be in the police.
The woman’s family – devout Catholics and and the staunch Republicans did everything in their power to stop the wedding.
They got the PP around to put pressure on the girl.
The woman’s parents threatened not to attend the wedding and banned all other family members from attending.
They threatened to cut the woman out of their wills.
They refused to give the woman the gift of money they had given to all their other children who had married.
They threatened to disrupt the wedding ceremony.
They said they would disown the woman and any children she might have.
They told her she would be banned from their funerals.
The fact that the groom had been abandoned by his wife and was faultless in the marriage break up was irrelevant to them.
He was a Protestant and a police man and that was worse than him being a mass murder.
They insisted that their Roman Catholic faith would not allow them to attend the wedding.
Their PP told them not to support an invalid marriage and a couple living in sin.
They could not ask themselves “What would Jesus do”?
They could not put their love for their daughter before the rules of a corrupt man-made religion.
They were brainwashed – and happy to be brainwashed.
This kind of thing shows you the fruits of organised religion and the prejudice and nastiness it brings.
Jesus reduced all God’s commandments to two – love your God and love your neighbour.
Why dont his followers do as he commands.
BISHOP PAT BUCKLEY 