Depicted world values 'unreliable'

The world's values as found in popular magazines are 'unreliable' as guidelines to spiritual growth and decent human living, Fr Paddy Ryan said yesterday.

In his homily at Sunday Mass, he added that those depicted values are often 'the very opposite' of decent living.

He also said that the pressure to go along with fashion and fads is 'enormous'. "Peer pressure doesn't stop at childhood," he cautioned. "Even as adults we often feel the urge to go along with the crowd."

Noting that some of the values we are offered are 'basically selfish', he said that those, such as Christians, who spend their lives for others 'will gain lives'. "We don't set out to look for happiness, we set out to serve, and because we do, happiness comes as a natural result."

He asked those present to take some time in the coming days to look at their own lives, and see whether they evaluate their successes in terms of the Gospel, or in the consumer society's 'offerings of fads and fashions'?

Brian Byrne.