We are told that DF has made his clergy changes for this August and has emailed them to the priests.
We are also told he has asked the Vatican for two new auxiliary bishops.
But is this not just moving the chairs on the sinking Titanic?
The numbers attending Mass will not recover for a very long time, if ever.
The financial knock-on effect of this is that Dublin finances will go down and down.
Also, the RCC is in the eyes of so many now a criminal and sexual abuse pariah.
We are living through ANOTHER REFORMATION.
And this reformation is being played out in front of the global media and the global social media.
If a monk fathered a child 400 years ago it would only be a local scandal.
Now if a monk fathers a child it is known about in 5 minutes in places from Alaska to Thailand.
The global media and the global social media is acting like a magifnying glass on the RCC’s scandals – showing them up in all their ugly guises.
For the RCC to recover it would have to change absolutely radically.
And that will not happen because those with power do not want change and will not allow it.
So it will become an increasingly shrinking corporation.
FOR ME
Fortunately for me, I say, I no longer operate under the massive illusion that the RCC has anything remotely to do with either God or Christianity.
I lived with that illusion for perhaps the first 25 years of my life but as soon as I was ordained and began to move in clerical circles, the scales fell from my eyes.
Very soon I met bullying and sadistic clerics. I also met the “weak” ones – the alcoholics, the mentally ill ones, the hopeless ones.
But the sadistic ones opened my eyes. They bullied their curates, the people, church workers etc.
They were total cynics – having no faith or prayer life – but simply enjoying the gravy train.
The resolution for me was not to be part of them – to be independent of them – and to focus on Jesus and not on the Judas types – althought that’s probably unfair to poor Judas.
We dont need the RCC to have our relationship with the Lord.
God is as available to everyone in their homes and bedrooms as he is in a church.
In fact, considering what some priests are doing in the churches and on altars, people are safer at home.
We have allowed the clerics to hijack the sacraments.
Every person can baptise.
It the couple who are the ministers of marriage.
A good act of contrition is as good as, if not better than, chatting to a questionable man in a dark wardrobe.
Like Hans Kung, I believe that any group of Christians sitting in a circle and sincerely breaking bread and wine have the real presence of God and Jesus with them.
That does not mean that I do not treasure and enjoy the more formal Eucharist as we have it.
But it the clerics saying: “You can only have Jesus if you do what I tell you to do” that is crazy.
God is not bound by theology or canon law.
The Spirit blows where it will.
I love the old Jewish saying:
“You think it is a niracle when God does what the priests ask.
I thinks its a greater miracle when the priests do what God asks”.
Over 2000 years we have codified the un-codifiable God.
The future is in allowing the Real God to surprise us, everyday, with his infinite spontaneity.
God does not allow himself to be the prisoner of the priest’s gold tabernacle.
Nor does he want his sons and daughters to be the captives of the New Pharisees – the hierarchy and clergy of the RCC.
I wonder if truths like this ever cross the minds of DF in Dublin and Amy in Armagh?
KERRY DIOCESAN APPOINTMENTS
Diocese of Kerry Appointments July 2021
Bishop Ray Browne wishes to announce the following changes of appointment of clergy of the Diocese of Kerry:
Retirements:
Fr. Tom Crean, PP Kenmare.
Fr. John Lawlor, PP Ballydonoghue.
Fr. Con Buckley, PP Kilgarvan.
Appointments:
Fr. George Hayes PP Glenflesk to be PP Kenmare.
Fr. Kevin McNamara, PP Moyvane to be PP Glenflesk.
Fr. Brendan Carmody SJ to be PP Moyvane.
Fr. Martin Spillane, PP Caherdaniel, to be PP Brosna.
Fr. Bernard Healy further Studies Rome to be CC, St. John’s, Tralee.
The parish of Ballydonoghue will be served by the priests of the North Kerry Pastoral Area, with Fr. Sean Hanafin as Moderator.
The parish of Kilgarvan will be served by the priests of the Kenmare Pastoral Area, with Fr. Joe Begley as Moderator.
The parish of Caherdaniel will be served by the priests of the Iveragh Pastoral Area with Fr. Gerard Finucane as Moderator.
BISHOP PAT BUCKLEY 