Fr. Tony Flannery’s censure by Vatican was necessary!

IRELAND
Renew America

By Eamonn Keane

Since April 2012, Irish Redemptorist priest, Fr. Tony Flannery, has been at the centre of a controversy over questions of Catholic doctrine that has gained media coverage in many parts of the English-speaking world.

News of the controversy erupted in April 2012 when the Catholic Church’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (hereafter CDF) instructed Fr. Flannery to discontinue his regular column in Reality magazine which is a publication of the Redemptorist Order in Ireland. Amongst other things, the CDF exists to help the Pope carry out his duty of guarding Catholics from false doctrine and its negative impacts on their understanding and practice of the faith.

The CDF censure of Fr. Flannery was all the more noteworthy given that he was a founding member and one of the spokespersons of the Association of Catholic Priests (hereafter ACP) in Ireland. The ACP claims to have a membership of 1000, representing about twenty five percent of priests in Ireland.

Many media headlines reporting on the controversy portrayed Fr. Flannery as a victim of an abusive use of power by Pope Benedict XVI and the CDF. Some examples of this are: “Hoover FBI tactics used against Irish priests by Vatican” (IrishCentral, April 7, 2012); “Fr Flannery may not be burned at the stake but the censure is itself frightening” (Irish Examiner, April 9, 2012); “Dissent in the Catholic Church, especially from members of the clergy, invariably elicits a mailed fist reaction from the Vatican” (Irish Examiner, April 7, 2012); “Pope has consistently come down on dissent within the church like a hammer” (Irish Times, April 18, 2012); “Fr. Flannery’s grasp of theology better than that of his silencers” (Catholic National Reporter, January 25, 2013).

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