Angry, isolated, paranoid and ageing, many of Ireland’s ‘ordinary’
Catholic priests feel failed and abandoned by the church hierarchy.
But
where were the ‘good priests’ when they were needed?
THE VOICEMAIL
was succinct. “Why don’t you, Mister Hoban, f**k off back to Rome with
your nuncio . . . Piss off back to Rome, you f**ked-up celibates.”
There
were more.
“Keep away from my children, you bunch of perverts,” for
example.
Fr Brendan Hoban transcribed these voicemails dutifully,
along with other parish messages.
He reveals the wording after some
reluctance.
His hesitancy is rooted in the same terror that has sent
most priests deep into their parish bunkers this week, the terror of
appearing to place the anguish of their own tattered, lonely souls above
the suffering of the victims of clerical abuse.
So last week,
when the Cloyne report was crashing into the public consciousness,
Hoban, the 63-year-old parish priest of Ballina, Co Mayo, would have
returned to the empty parochial house, heard the messages and told no
one.
Then he would have repaired to his icy livingroom, where the
sleeping bag on the armchair and the little plug-in radiator bear
testament to the mean summer temperature of the ugly, soulless house he
calls home.
Meanwhile, Enda Kenny was launching an unprecedented,
historic attack on the Vatican in Dáil Éireann, accusing it of
downplaying or “managing” the rape and torture of children “to uphold
instead the primacy of the institution, its power, standing and
‘reputation’ ”.
Ireland, he declared, was not Rome but “a republic of
laws . . . where the delinquency and arrogance of a particular version,
of a particular kind of ‘morality’, will no longer be tolerated or
ignored”.
Brendan Hoban wonders what all the fuss is about.
Enda
Kenny was saying nothing that Irish priests haven’t been saying for
years, he claims, about what the bishops should be doing.
“In effect, he
is challenging Rome as distinct from the Irish church. We have no
problem living in a democratic republic and I think we have shown
ourselves, in the main, as people who have made a contribution to that
republic . . . We have been waiting a long, long time for the bishops to
say: ‘Let us run our own affairs, rather than tying our hands behind
our backs . . .’ ”
But the Taoiseach’s statement does raise a
concern, he adds.
“It’s that the Republic could become a cold place for
Irish Catholics, as a result of an unnecessary confrontation between
church and state. We fear that people would take from Enda Kenny’s
statement that this is a dressing-down of priests and bishops, when it’s
a dressing-down of Cloyne and Rome, and could be regarded as fodder for
other agendas that might be coming up.”
Indeed, the Taoiseach was
careful to address the anguish of the “good priests” in his statement:
“This Roman clericalism must be devastating for good priests, some of
them old, others struggling to keep their humanity, even their sanity,
as they work so hard to be the keepers of the church’s light and
goodness within their parishes, communities and the human heart.”
For
them, their powerlessness has long been confirmed in the heedless
appointment of bishops lacking the competence, intellect or independence
of spirit to address the spiritual needs of a rapidly evolving
republic; bishops such as Cloyne’s John Magee.
“He never worked in a
parish, so had no experience of how to run a parish, never mind a
diocese. I’m not blaming him for that – it’s back to who appointed him,”
says Fr Billy O’Donovan, of Conna, in the Cloyne diocese.
It was
Rome that handed the power to John Magee to appoint a head of child
protection.
Magee chose Msgr Denis O’Callaghan, then in his late 70s.
Says another priest: “Denis O’Callaghan is an absent-minded professor –
and they put him in charge of child protection?”
O’Callaghan is “a man with a great heart”, says Fr Hoban, “but completely disorganised”.
THERE
IS CLEARLY a deep anger among ordinary priests.
This is reflected in
the 550-plus membership of the fledgling Association of Catholic
Priests.
But where were those angry, articulate voices when the damage
was being done, when Rome was directing this republic’s affairs and
their brothers in Christ were violating the young and vulnerable?
They
were where they always were, says Hoban, “trying to do 1,001 things and
trying to do them the best they can.”
So does that explain their
silence?
There are two “difficulties”, Hoban says.
The first is the
mistaken belief that a diocese is run by the bishop and the priests
together.
“The fact is we are totally excluded from any say . . .
Priests are effectively disenfranchised.”
The other difficulty is
loyalty.
Priests live isolated lives.
“The dynamic of our ministry is
that friends are very few and far between, but there is extraordinarily
strong loyalty among the clergy,” Hoban says.
As well as that, “we were
not people who would challenge the status quo. Those who would were
weeded out in the seminary.”
Then there is the perennial problem of
being “at the bishop’s mercy” in relation to transfers and advancement.
And thus the silence.
Does it all sound a bit self-serving?
“Yes, it’s
fair to say that it was self-serving. That lack of moral courage.”
To
illustrate this, he describes how a bishop and liturgists have been
traversing the Irish dioceses, giving seminars to priests on the
controversial new missal translations.
Despite the huge unease there was
little or no reaction from audiences.
Then the bishop came to Knock,
where he overran his speaking time, leaving no time for the pre-lunch
question-and-answer session.
After lunch he launched straight into
speaking mode again, whereupon one brave soul stood up and stated that a
discussion was needed.
It sounds like the scene where Oliver Twist asks
for more food.
Slowly, amazingly, the courageous priest was followed by
several more.
“The liturgists were amazed because they presumed there was no opposition, as they hadn’t seen it before,” says Hoban.
Or
maybe they hadn’t been reading the papers. It demonstrates what a cold
place the church can be for a dissident, says Hoban.
“And we have reaped
the whirlwind . . . If a good guy said anything , he said it to the
bishop or the parish priest and felt that he’d done what was required.
Guys find themselves in situations where their instinct says this
doesn’t concern me. Because the message always was: go into your parish;
diocesan policy is not your concern.”
In short, blinded by
loyalty and conformism, priests trusted too much.
Now, pole-axed by
fear, they are overcompensating.
Some have described their fellow clergy
as “evil priests” in newspapers; one urges people to boycott the church
collections.
The priests’ fear is no longer of the bishops; it’s
of the head-spinning no-man’s-land where they now find themselves.
Ageing and isolated, they are operating in hostile territory where their
Rome-appointed shepherds are themselves in a state of confused terror –
“running around like 27 headless chickens”, according to Fr Tony
Flannery – and where the Irish church’s straight-talking totem,
Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, has effectively alienated them all.
The
isolation and exclusion, compounded by this alienation from their
bishops, explains much of the sense of abandonment and fear felt by many
priests.
“The feeling is that in their lifetime there will be no
end to this,” says Hoban. “For 10 years they’re blue in the face going
to courses, seminars, studying guidelines . . . You could call it a high
state of paranoia. Then, after all that, something happens in Cloyne
and the bottom falls out of it.”
But the paranoia has also
infected the priests’ day-to-day pastoral work.
“A woman comes to the
door who may have psychiatric problems . . . What do I do? Take a chance
by letting her into my front room? There is no doubt that priests have
withdrawn, that they’ve become ultracareful and ultrasensitive on how
they might be compromised.”
This is the raw terror of men who find
themselves accused and deserted.
It’s another reason why so few are
prepared to go public about anything.
“There is a phobia among
them,” says Hoban. “It’s to do with the fear of accusations, especially
ones that go back 30 years. It could be about exposure of an
indiscretion from when he was a young priest. Or he could have a nervous
disposition and have a phobia of false accusations being made.”
Privately,
priests believe that some of those historic accusations are deeply
suspect or
“shady”, as one put it.
“But you’re considered guilty from
the word go,” say Fr Billy O’Donovan. “You almost have to prove your
innocence.”
Accused priests have been publicly stood down, excised
instantly from the diocesan directory, left with little or no income,
ordered to vacate the parish house in days.
It depends entirely on
individual bishops.
“There can’t be a priest in this country who
doesn’t think the HSE and the civil authorities shouldn’t be informed as
a matter of course ,” says Fr B, a priest who was falsely accused, “but
there is also a matter of natural justice.”
Others cite the case
of Canon Niall Ahern, who in 2006 was falsely accused of an offence
alleged to have occurred some 35 years earlier.
He was back in ministry
within months, but not before he had been publicly stood down by his
bishop, stigmatised and humiliated in numerous ways.
Even when he was
restored to ministry he endured headlines such as “Slur Fr returns to
pulpit”.
THE COMPLEXITY of the issue is highlighted by Fr Billy
O’Donovan.
He was asked by the diocese to be the official support for
the Cloyne priest who was the subject of Bishop Magee’s notorious
contradictory letters, one to Rome and a completely different one for
diocesan files.
O’Donovan and the accused priest had been friends and
their families had been friends.
“But the complexity is that the
complainant would also be known to my family,” O’Donovan says.
“The
awkwardness would be that the complainant’s family would assume that I’d
be on the priest’s side.”
Having vehemently protested his
innocence to anyone who would listen, that priest ultimately pleaded
guilty in court to indecency charges.
O’Donovan doesn’t comment on the
effect of this on him personally, merely saying that he remains in the
role of support person.
Another priest speaks to us on condition
of anonymity. Fr B, ageing and in poor health, yearns for what he calls
“an adult conversation” with senior church figures about his ordeal.
“I’m not looking for money or an apology. I want us to own what
happened.”
But, as O’Donovan puts it, the problem is that “of course false allegations have been made, but far too many have been proved”.
Nonetheless, this issue crystallises the abyss that now divides many bishops from their priests. There is no trust of any kind.
“We
have the feeling that a facade is being created, such as in the
Eucharistic Congress and the new texts, a pretence that all the troubles
are now being dealt with and that, from here on, the church will
flourish,” says Hoban.
“We are not encouraging people to join us. We
know it’s not going to solve any problems. In this diocese there will be
eight priests left from an original 34 in 20 years’ time. There is no
planning . . . The whole thing is imploding with no recognition of
this.”
Many trace the current problems to the abandonment of the
Vatican II vision of a church of the laity, with parish councils at the
core.
“Mostly it hasn’t happened . . . So when abuse cases arose they
were dealt with by clergy, not by mothers and fathers,” says Hoban.
Now
the last of the so-called Vatican II priests are disappearing, and the
few young men who are replacing them are universally perceived as
fiercely traditional and conservative.
Over and over, my conversations
with priests return to the calibre of church leaders.
This is why
O’Donovan, even during Cloyne’s traumatic week, believes that there is a
“far more important week ahead”, meaning the appointment of a new
bishop.
“Names being mentioned or guessed at are all right wing,
conservative and with a Rome background,” he says.
“We’ve been there
before . . . My biggest fear – and it is a real fear – is that someone
would be appointed that priests and people will find unacceptable, and
that many, priests and people, will walk in that event. We’ve taken
enough. We want someone who will talk to us and listen to us.”
Would
Irish priests support a breakaway from Rome?
“No,” says Hoban. “What
you’re talking about here is the nature of the church. We are deeply
unhappy with the competency of the leadership and the drift of Rome. The
consultation and transparency we talk about, well, it’s not going to
happen in our lifetime. But, to live with yourself, you have to keep
saying the things you’re saying. The Association of Catholic Priests is
the last fling of the dice.”
Behind all this is the reality of a
laity that is voting with its feet.
“That’s the other unspoken thing,”
Hoban says. “Our ability to speak to their needs is problematic. We
don’t have the ability or the connection to speak out of their world.
And that’s the result of celibacy, formation and the loneliness of the
ministry.”
Why do they stay? “I’m 63,” Hoban says. “What else do I
know? If I was 40 I’d look at things differently. There is a sense now
that you’re in it and you’re loyal to it and that you owe something to
the people you’ve worked with.”
But he is under no illusion. “Age
and oddity go hand in hand. And, as someone said, there’s no one odder
than an odd priest. It’s also been said that there is no one deader than
a dead priest. People get on with it . . . We’re just functionaries.
“Tomorrow,
the reality is that I will do a funeral for a family who have lost a
father. That is probably the biggest thing that has happened to them in
their lives, and they will remember every detail of this day. And you
will do your part to the best of your ability. And at the end of it
you’ll be able to look back and say: ‘It matters; I made a difference.’
That’s what the good guys are at.”