Tony Flannery

This is a really interesting exchange between the Chief Commissioner and a retired bishop, attempting to explain why the Church did not report cases of abuse by priests to civil authorities.

A flawed intellectual framework and its disconnect from civil society (Main Forum)
by Maitland, Australia, Sunday, September 18, 2016,

This from exchange between Justice McClellan, Chief Commissioner and emeritus Bishop of Parramatta, Bede Heather last Wednesday (21/09/16) afternoon:

Q. You see, what you’re telling me now has been said to
us by a number of senior and not so senior members of the
church, you understand?

The answers to the two questions on religion in the poll conducted among Irish farmers, and published in the Irish Examiner, are really interesting. 82% are in favour of priests being allowed to marry, and, even more surprisingly, 58% are in favour of women being ordained as priests, with 52% strongly in favour.
And to put this in context, of those polled 69% are regular Mass attenders, meaning that they attend Mass every weekend.

I had a stimulating chat with a man who spends half of each year doing humanitarian work in Africa, and the other half back here in Ireland. Having told me about Africa, what motivates him, how much he loves the people there, and what he is involved in, I asked him about the contrasts between his life in Africa and back home in Ireland.
“They must be two very different realities”, I said.