Cardinals in Chaos, Bishops in Peril
I see in the Irish Times that Bishop Willie Walsh (last seen walking
around his diocese, apologising to people as he went for any hurt the church
had caused them, and therefore not likely to ever be made a Cardinal) said
that Canon Law had to take second place to the Law of the Land. This isn't a
position that either the Vatican or Cardinal Connell have ever really
accepted.
--Edit--
For loads more on this, the RTE site is giving a running commentary today. The first set of scandals in Ferns prompted Bishop Commiskey (who had something of a liquid intake problem) to resign. But he was a fringe figure in the hierarchy anyway. Cardinal Connell is the Pope's man in Ireland.
Even still, when even the government ministers are starting to push for a statement, as Minister for Health Martin did, he's got to be feeling the push.
Listening to the radio, squished into the DART carriage on the way home, I heard that the Boston laity are considering stopping their contributions to the church, and instead setting up lay committees to collect the money and distribute it to places and people they're happy with.
Nothing could be more effective.
And for the moment, nothing could be less likely to happen here.
But wait for two more waves of rage, and you'll start to see this kind of radical thinking starting to look like the only way to get anything done.
10:32:24 PM 
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