{"id":260266,"date":"2025-12-31T18:24:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-31T18:24:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/260266\/"},"modified":"2025-12-31T18:24:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-31T18:24:08","slug":"archbishop-eamon-martin-saddened-by-online-christian-commentators-armed-for-battle-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/260266\/","title":{"rendered":"Archbishop Eamon Martin \u2018saddened\u2019 by online Christian commentators \u2018armed for battle\u2019 \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Aggression by Christian commentators on social media has been described by the Catholic Primate of Ireland as \u201cnot of God\u201d. <\/p>\n

In a new year message, Archbishop Eamon Martin<\/a> expressed concern that social media may be influencing people to come to conversations and relationships as if \u201carmed for battle\u201d. <\/p>\n

He said he is \u201csaddened when I see people of faith online who seem \u2018armed to the teeth\u2019, and who persist in \u2018othering\u2019 and accentuating difference\u201d.<\/p>\n

It was \u201cparticularly disappointing when you see this from Christians online who label and dismiss others because of their race, religion or some other perceived difference. This is not of God,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Quoting from Pope Leo<\/a>\u2019s message for 2026, the Archbishop continued that \u201cit has become increasingly common to drag the language of faith into political battles, to bless nationalism, and to justify violence and armed struggle in the name of religion. Believers must actively refute, above all by the witness of their lives, these forms of blasphemy that profane the holy name of God.\u201d<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Pope Leo decries conditions for Palestinians in Gaza in first Christmas sermonOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

He noted how \u201cPope Leo prefers a disarmed peace, which is not about \u2018weaponising thoughts and words\u2019, but about healing, showing mercy and forgiveness, reconciling and bridge-building.\u201d <\/p>\n

Archbishop Martin emphasised, \u201cThis is one of the ways that religions in general, and Christianity in particular, can continue to play a vital role in the public square – by witnessing and being signs of peace, by holding humanity and the world back from the brink of self-destruction, endless conflict, violent displacement of peoples and death.\u201d<\/p>\n

He was \u201chopeful that even amid what the late Pope Francis<\/a> called \u2018a third world war fought piecemeal\u2019, peacemakers can continue to resist the spread of darkness, standing as sentinels in the night\u201d.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cWe must reject the spread of despair, the massive investment in rearmament, and those who would talk up threats and the \u2018inevitability\u2019 of war. We do not give up on peace.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Aggression by Christian commentators on social media has been described by the Catholic Primate of Ireland as \u201cnot…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":260267,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[132793,9,10,2512,13,14,6,11,12,15,16,5,2513,2515,7,8,65,66,67],"class_list":{"0":"post-260266","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-archbishop-eamon-martin","9":"tag-breaking-news","10":"tag-breakingnews","11":"tag-catholic-church","12":"tag-featured-news","13":"tag-featurednews","14":"tag-headlines","15":"tag-latest-news","16":"tag-latestnews","17":"tag-main-news","18":"tag-mainnews","19":"tag-news","20":"tag-pope-francis","21":"tag-pope-leo-xiv","22":"tag-top-stories","23":"tag-topstories","24":"tag-world","25":"tag-world-news","26":"tag-worldnews"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115815583816713985","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260266","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260266"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260266\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/260267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260266"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260266"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260266"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}