Vatican Chastises Irish Priest for Liberal Views

Edmonton Journal
April 13, 2012

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/life/Vatican+chastises+Irish+priest+liberal+views/6459114/story.html

An Irish priest was summoned to Rome and asked to retire to a monastery last month after he voiced views in favour of liberal reforms for the Catholic Church.

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the main guardian of the Church's dogma, did not reportedly take kindly to Father Tony Flannery's pronouncements on contraception, the marriage of priests and women's ordination.

The Vatican Insider website, citing informed sources, said the 65-year-old priest, one of the founders of the Association of Irish Priests, was called back to Rome by the superior general of his Redemptorist order, Father Michael Brehl.

The alleged incident happened last month before the Vatican published a report on its eight-month inspection of the Irish Catholic Church following a wave of thousands of abuse scandals that has badly shaken faith in the Church.

Brehl requested Flannery not to speak or write on these subjects and to retire to a monastery, the Vatican Insider said.

Flannery also earned the wrath of senior clerics when he supported Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny's condemnation of the Vatican.

Some clergy have blamed the child abuse on all-powerful clericalism and on the sexual immaturity of the clergy and have called for liberal reforms.

The report said that Brehl was himself upbraided by the prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal William Levada, for a pro-reform article Flannery wrote in a magazine.

The Association of Irish Priests, which has 820 members out of Ireland's 3,400 priests, has condemned the Vatican's action against Flannery .

In its report on the Catholic Church in Ireland last month, the Vatican said its inspectors had noted a tendency of dissent in the clergy.