SCOTLAND
Herald Scotland
Wednesday 6 March 2013
TWO more of Scotland’s ageing bishops are expected to be stood down by the summer, as a leading Catholic voice has predicted the wake of the Cardinal Keith O’Brien scandal will be a priority for the next Pope.
Bishop of Motherwell Joe Devine and his counterpart in the Diocese of Galloway, John Cunningham, have submitted their resignations having both turned 75 in recent months but have been expected to hang on until replacements are found.
In the case of a former Glasgow archbishop this took three years.
However, the crisis following the revelations of Cardinal O’Brien’s “inappropriate behaviour” towards young priests in the 1980s and his subsequent admissions of sexual behaviour, on top of collapsing morale across the Catholic Church, are understood to have accelerated the need for change in Scotland.
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