THE country’s most senior catholic bishop has hit out the emergence of “a new language of racism” describing himself as “horrified” to find “traces of such racism among believers”.

Archbishop Diarmuid Martin made his comments in his homily at the Church of St Joseph the Artisan, Bonnybrook in Dublin, to mark the beginning of Advent.

He said that though racist language was at times understated in its expression, it was “just as nasty in its effects on men and women who need our help, our care and our respect”.

The terms “refugee” and “asylum seeker” Dr Martin said should only arouse heartfelt concern in the Christian heart.

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He said Advent was a time to think of the evil, violence, and the injustice that exists in our society and that Christians are called to be attentive to where society is slipping into wrong ways and to cry out like a prophet “as a voice of protest and condemnation”.

Dr Martin’s comments follow recent protests against plans to accommodate asylum seekers in former hotels in several towns including Oughterard, Ballinamore, Achill and Rooskey.

Elsewhere in his homily, Archbishop Martin expressed concern over those who are “burdened by homelessness and poverty, intolerance and discrimination, suffering and anxiety” and prayed for their deliverance.

Referring to the recent gangland deaths in Dublin and beyond he said in Bonnybrook parish, “I think of the renewed violence on our streets and the callousness of those who feel they can intimidate our society into weakening our opposition to that business of death that is the drug trade.”

Warning the faithful to be on their guard towards a “seductive culture” that “plays down the significance of new life and the value of each life”, he said it introduces into our culture “criteria which would determine that one life has less value than another”.

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