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"Be certain that I will be reflecting carefully as we enter into Holy Week, Easter and Pentecost."





Or,

"I'll give it a couple of months; see if things calm down a bit."










cynical git

"We have to stop the drip, drip, drip of revelations of failure."

No, Cardinal, quite the opposite. It ALL has to come out. It has been covered up for too long.

"I am ashamed" - In Japan shame would result in ----.

Look fella, you've been caught, seeking sympathy isn't going to cut it. You must resign, turn yourself into the cops, head to the treasury and give all of the loot away to the victims, lead the movement to rid the Vatican of priests and stop bullying the emotional with absurd tales of the myth of Christ.

It is about time that churches and clerics be taxed like everyone else. They are are businesses too.

From the Times, yesterday:

"Pope to give 'moral guidance' during UK visit"



Have you ever heard anything so hysterically funny?

Why are the taxpayers footing the bill for that? Surely if we want to attend a sports or other entertainment event then the individual should pay the costs.

Have read the Cardinal's sermon in full and it just wont do.

There has been plenty of time for reflection, that's what the Ferns and Murphy reports were for. Its time for action.

It smacks of him stalling for time and appealing to the Pope's forthcoming "pastoral" letter (What????) Cardinal, we dont trust the Pope! And as for his words about wounded healers, he still hasnt got it. This is about the wounded, the abused, not about those who covered up.

"Cardinal Sean Brady, the Primate of All Ireland, has confirmed he was present at a closed canonical tribunal in 1975 when two child victims of Father Brendan Smyth were ordered to sign agreements under oath that they would not discuss what happened to them with anybody other than an approved priest."



Criminal and nothing short of that. Let's not forget that the Italian mafia men learned their stock and trade from being altar boys.

The altar boy scam should be up too, that is where a ready supply of innocent children were picked over for the seminary.

To date there is no evidence of gods, anything supernatural or life after death. If ever such things are discovered, science will be the first to let us know.

I must go now and this distracts from working on my Phd in Leprechaun-ology.

Nice man. Not very bright.
We need him to go.

By the way,
Hegarty's the front-runner,
followed by McAreavey and Treanor.

A system in crisis doesn't have much imagination.

Rusty

I looked them all up and, if they're running today, its not at Cheltenham.

Impressed by your posts, btw.

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I was actually *slightly* impressed by Bishop McAreavey's comments in the aftermath of the reports on the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ. He sounds like a good man at heart. But there is an ongoing assumption that this organisation needs a Chief Executive. It needs a Receiver, following on to a Liquidator.

I think the Cardinal's speech goes some considerable way towards recognising the personal and corporate failures which have blighted the lives of so many Catholics on this island. I think it is important, however, to understand this dual nature of the responsibility for the situation: in the face of a coherent, pervasive, and adamant ethos, however flawed, only the extraordinarily independently-minded are able to think never mind act counter-culturally, the thoughts of the individual are literally processed by the institution.

I have no doubt but that any sincere and sensitive Christian who has played an unthinking role in the church's handling of this grievous sin, and I am sure there are many for whom this is the case, will look back on his actions in the light of new understanding and feel real and genuine pain at his conformity and failures. Bianco di Sienna speaks of how love and lowliness cause the heart to "weep with loathing" over its own shortcomings. I trust that such is the case today.

How a penitent might convey sensitively that the extent of his sorrow is as a wound in his own soul is the most difficult of undertakings. Matching the intention and the tone requires the kind of empathic communication skills which the church sadly lacks. It is not, however, communication skills which the church needs now, it is, as RJB has noted, faith: faith in its people and faith in its vision of God.

In many ways resignations and the introduction of a new untainted leadership is too easy a solution, one which smacks of burying the past and sanitising the problem. A more courageous solution is for those who were, at whatever level, involved in the cover-up to take responsibility for the restitution and restoration which is now so desperately required. The only way to stop drip-drip revelation is to open the archive and make a totally clean breast of the whole situation, to repent of the evil, and to take the consequences.

If he stays, Cardinal Brady is faced with a task which makes walking on water seem a doddle. St Peter, to whom he refers in his homily, stepped out of his boat only to start to sink until he reached out to grasp Christ's proffered hand. It is my earnest prayer that the Cardinal puts his hand in the hand of Christ this lent.

Goodbye to Hegarty

On reflection, one of the saddest things about Brady is that, as a thirty six year old he handed over moral responsibility to his superiors trusting that they would sort it out. They didnt.

Over thirty five years on, he is doing exactly the same thing by appealing to the up and coming letter from the Pope.

Brady is the top man in Ireland and he still wont make a move unless it is okayed by the Vatican. He is still, all these years later, guilty of a moral immaturity and continues to allow the plight of the abused to play second fiddle to Church concerns.

Diarmud Martin seems to be one of the few who is willing to think outside the box and speak genuinely and consistantly with the plight of the abused at the forefront of his thoughts. For this, it would appear that he is now being isolated by the other Bishops.



It will need to be some letter from the Pope!

It seems to me that the christian faith use 'sin' as a 'get out of jail free' card for everything. Do anything and say "I have sinned" and you're pretty much home and dry.

The Vatican seem to be blaming the devil for a lot of this.

Sadly, for this 'church' (when do we start calling it a pedofile ring?)they operate in a secular state and the citizens are looking for answers. If there are archives the police should go in and get them.

Just what do these people have to do before the good and decent catholic raise their hands up in disgust and walk away? Is this really the group you want representing your love of god?

DK

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apologies, I accidentally hit the send button on an empty comment box.