IRELAND
Mayo News
Fr Kevin Hegarty
IMAGINE if the director of the Bank of Ireland declared that he had no confidence in the financial procedures of the company. There would be a mass withdrawal of funds. It might even lead to the closure of the bank.
As a less dramatic level, something like that happened in the Catholic Church in Ireland last week.
The Archbishop of Dublin, Dr Diarmuid Martin, is the second ranking cleric in the Irish Catholic establishment and a trustee of St Patrick’s College in Maynooth. He announced that he was unhappy with seminary formation in the college and was sending Dublin student priests to the Irish College in Rome. Has he sounded the death knell for an institution that was once the biggest Catholic seminary in the world and the place where the vast majority of Irish priests have been trained since 1795. What is happening at Maynooth?
So far the complaints have been general and vague. Dr Martin stated that he is somewhat unhappy about an atmosphere which was growing in Maynooth. You’d learn about it through anonymous accusations made through anonymous letters and blogs, accusing people of misconduct or accusing the faculty of Maynooth of not treating allegations correctly.”
He went on to cite that “one of the allegations is that there is a homosexual, a gay culture and that students have been using an app called Grinder which is a gay dating app which would be inappropriate for seminarians.” The college authorities responded by saying that they shared the archbishop’s concern about the poisonous atmosphere created by anonymous allegations. They deny that a gay subculture exists in the seminary. They assert that students “with specific concerns are encouraged to report them appropriately.” Several bishops including the Archbishop of Armagh, Dr Eamon Martin, have rallied to the defence of Maynooth. In the happy event of having student priests, they will continue to send them to the college. So far no bishop has come out in support of Dr Diarmuid Martin, contributing to the impression that he is a kind of lone ranger amongst his colleagues.
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