Army shouldering Saints Remains

[onthefence]

I do thinks its odd. We are a free country and its what people want to do.
I assume the RC Church want to recruit as well.

[Odyessus]

Thought so. However, as I stated previously, the Church obviously wants the State to be seen to be backing this kind of cr@p. The Catholic Church is the Established Church of the Irish, after all.

How martyred you must feel! How crushingly oppressed! I suggest you take up your case with Amnesty international.

[oscartango]

No, I'll offer it up for Lent.

[Odyessus]

No, I'll offer it up for Lent.

Well done. You might be canonised yourself some day.

[FrankSpeaks]

Excuse me Six but if you read the posts in the thread you would see that, A soldier who participates is a volunteer, therefore the state incurs no cost.

Clearly the state incurs costs because there must be some travels costs involved and I am certain that the volunteers are not paying it out of their own pockets. The army should not be involved in this carry on.

[oscartango]

I'll keep my legs crossed then, Ody.

[absconded]

Clearly the state incurs costs because there must be some travels costs involved and I am certain that the volunteers are not paying it out of their own pockets. The army should not be involved in this carry on.

My guess is that most RDF involved would travel in their own vehicles to an event like this.That´s my experience at least. Unless you have evidence to the contrary, drop it.

[oscartango]

Clearly the state incurs costs because there must be some travels costs involved and I am certain that the volunteers are not paying it out of their own pockets. The army should not be involved in this carry on.

We have already established that the soldiers are in uniform, carry rifles with bayonets (and some have rounds too according to our informant above) and are transported in army vehicles. There must be some cost to the taxpayer involved.

However, if anything should go awry, the army washes its hands of the situation because they are only volunteering for these duties, not being paid, and are not, accordingly, "on active service". The insurance implications are uncertain.

That is the bit that would worry me. The religious nonsense pales into isignificance beside that.

[lostexpectation]

Army escort for saint's relics

Madam, – Who decides (and on what basis) whether a Defence Forces escort should be provided at a church parade for the remains of any particular individual, deemed “saint” or otherwise?

I refer to your photograph of March 2nd showing a party of soldiers bearing the reliquary of St Thérèse of Lisieux on formal parade. I consider this unconstitutional and an embarrassingly sectarian confusion of Church and State.

In my view, the Defence Forces should provide a church escort only where the deceased has been a distinguished Irish public servant or recognised statesman or stateswoman. – Yours, etc,

its funny how he can even see the equivalence between carrying the body of recently deceased person , who's done some state service, to the grave and this cult figure.

I ask again, why the army, where did they get this notion from that the army would carry this golden calf in the first place.

[oscartango]

After the Moving Statues comes the Moving Saints.