Sign here

The RC church seems to be finally getting around to dealing with the sale of pre-signed mass cards by third parties. This sinful practice has long been a source of scandal in the church. In fact, one could argue that similar sales of cards within church precincts is equally sinful, but that may be an argument for another day.

The third party ban seems to have percolated into the market already. I was perusing the RIP.ie site the other day when I saw there was a facility for sending sympathy cards over the internet.

When I checked this out I found that the section on pre-signed cards (illustrated above) produced the result: "No products are currently available in this category."

A little strange, nevertheless, as the Mellifont Cistercian Fathers seem to have been complicit in this particular operation.

Recent Irish legislation has already reined in this practice to those operations specifically approved by the church itself.

The next logical step would be to stop the sale of signed cards entirely. The theology would require the purchaser to pay for an unsigned card and then make an unspecified (no minimum) offering for the mass (signature) element. Let's wait and see.