IRELAND
Deutsche Welle

The Vatican used to be able to count on Irish clergy to follow the rules. But now a group of Irish priests are openly questioning the Vatican’s conservative approach to Catholicism, despite the threat of excommunication.

On Sunday, January 20, during a news conference in Dublin, Father Tony Flannery became the unlikely face of the modern Irish Catholic. Unlikely, because Flannery supports allowing women and married men to become priests. He embraces the role of lesbians and gays in the Catholic Church. Flannery also questions the legitimacy of the Vatican’s hierarchy, and he warns that unless power is decentralized and free thought is encouraged, church attendance in Ireland will continue to stagnate.

These views would seem to be counter to the regular average Irish churchgoer, who, according to numerous polls and surveys, is older and slightly more conservative than the general population.

But Flannery has been…