Come, Holy Spirit, and fill the hearts of your faithful,
enkindle in them the fire of your love.
You send forth your spirit and they are created,
you shall renew the face of the Earth.
News from Ireland - May 2012
We held a Silent Vigil for an hour at the residence of The Papal Nuncio on Sunday 29 April. The day was very cold. Nevertheless almost 300 people turned up to support us, some travelling long distances to take part. We wore yellow and white gags, some people carried placards. As we were on a busy road there was a lot of passing traffic and we were delighted that so many motorists sounded their horns in support. We posted a letter at the Nunciature.
We were very pleased with the media coverage we received. We featured on national TV news and twice that evening, we were reported on radio and newspapers reported the vigil next day with lots of pictures. Today we received a reply from the Nuncio. He does not mention WAC or our aims in his letter but is a communication and we will reply. We also had an increase in membership and increased hits on our Face book page as a result.
On Monday 7 May we took part Towards an Assembly, a meeting called by The Association of Catholic Priests, WAC and other groups. Over a thousand people attended and there was a great sense of energy and hope present. Brendan Butler, Joe Mulvaney and Phil Dunne of WAC addressed the meeting. TV, radio and the press reported the event widely before the event and afterwards. Some priests who have been silenced were present although they did not address the gathering. One of the speakers Fr Adrian Egan the superior of a Redemptorist community spoke of his pride in his fellow Redemptorists Tony Flannery and Gerry Moloney and of the training in moral theology he had received from Fr Sean Fagan. Speeches from the meeting will be put on the association website shortly.
There will be a follow-up meeting on 30 May.
We are now planning our Liturgy for Pentecost Sunday in a central Dublin hotel. We will pray especially for the leadership meeting of American Women Religious which will be held two days later. In June we hope to have a meeting with our membership to review the past 9 months since WAC re grouped in Ireland and to plan for next year.
Phil Dunne
A Communiqué from ITCCS International Brussels and Dublin:It is with great sadness that We Are Church (UK) brings you this news: sadness that the Pope, the Princes of the Church and Bishops do not have ears to hear and the will to adhere to the wishes of the Second Vatican Council, but also sadness that some people in the Church are moved to such confrontation. This is not the way of We Are Church which wants dialogue among the whole people of God on the issues that confront the Church today. The Church suffers because the trappings of wealth and power have seduced the Church leadership away from following the message of Jesus. We can only pray "Come, Holy Spirit, enkindle the hearts of your faithful ....." Catholic Church faces disruption and banishment as Irish Cardinal set to resignThe Roman Catholic Church faces permanent disruption and banishment in at least five countries if it does not comply with ten “non-negotiable measures” by September 15, 2012, according to a global coalition of survivors of church rape and torture. The list of measures was issued today at a meeting in Dublin, Ireland between Archbishop Dermot Martin and representatives of Anti Catholic Church Activists Worldwide (ACCAW), Magdalene Laundry survivors, and the International Tribunal into Crimes of Church and State – Ireland (ITCCS). The measures demanded of the Catholic Church include the defrocking of all child raping priests, the licensing of all other clergy as public servants, the return of the remains of all who died under Church care, the annulment of tax exemptions and other Church privileges, and the return of all of the Church’s wealth generated by the exploitation of children. The full statement outlining these measures may be found here. These are in the video below.
The shape of things to come?We posted thiis just over a year ago. It seems today that it is even more relevant as the gulf between the rulers and the ruled become wider. What would Jesus have said? Richard Sipe's website invites you to appreciate the cost of looking good Vatican Versus American NunsWe believe this is an important comment posted by Fr Richard Rohr on his blog, "Richard Rohr, Unpacking Paradoxies" on 10 May 2012 |



