Berets, bucks and bishop
Sir: George Gale (Viewpoint', 11 October) reports Dr Matthias Defregger, - the suspended auxiliary Bishop of Munich, as having said : `. . . I have carried a heavy burden, which no confessor and no public opinion can take away'. It is no glibness at all to point out that confession, in the Catholic way, exists for that very purpose : to take away the burden of human 'insuffi- ciency' as the Bishop describes his own behaviour during the episode that has now brought him into public notice. Confession proper does take away the weight of sin : `Cast thy care upon the Lord and He will sustain thee'. The type and degree of `care' are not specified and as they could have been with just a few more words it is pre- sumed that 'care' here is all-inclusive. Con- fession exonerates because it is non- confession which is the burden. Reparation is something different.
While I am sermonising may I refer to another quotation, `the Voltairean Ehrard says, is born from two irrecon- cilables, God exists: man suffers', from John McManners's article, `Sage as codfish' (4 October). They are not irreconcilable as I myself (apart from anyone else who may have done it) have reconciled them. But it would take a deep disquisition from me to substantiate this claim and a deep disquisi- tion from me is what you don't want. Gadd exists : men suffer.
Thomas W. Gadd 40 Station Road, Winchmore Hill, London N21
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