The Church of Ireland . I’m not sure but isn’t that a branch of the ” established church” with the Queen as its head.? I’ll stand corrected.

@Strongbow62 No the Queen of England is not the head of the Church of Ireland. The Church of Ireland is an autonomous province of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of All Ireland is our most senior bishop and, yes you could say he’s at our head, and the Archbishop of Canterbury is the focus of unity for all Anglicans.

At last some sence, yes Sean u are totally correct, its time, possibly well overdue that a break away Irish catholic church be formed by the likes of fr Brian and other like minded priests, let’s get the thing moving, will someone ask him before it’s too late.

Yes. It exists. It’s called the Church of Ireland.

Conor: Everything you say may be true. I do not know.

What I do know is that Fr D’Arcy can still give those electrifying homilies and do that great pastoral work. However, when it comes to his writing on certain theological matters, he has to ensure that what he writes is in not in conflict with the teaching of the Church.

As a member of a religious order, he took an oath of obedience many decades ago. This is not some new, unexplained part of his job description.

I would argue that obedience is one thing and calling out your ‘boss’ when they do something manifestly, plainly and obviously wrong is another matter. If your boss was apparently a nice chap when you joined and then turned into an unpleasant, craven self-serving lunatic then you can call them on it and call yourself a hero.

Al, I think you’ll find that Brian’s oath of allegiance to Rome, is superseded by his oath to an ancient, Jewish philosopher named Jesus, upon which Rome’s faith is supposedly constructed. Rome’s stance, is currently an anathema to the teaching of Jesus. Indeed, it is more akin to the teaching of Attila the Hun. How much longer do we allow the setting of the sun to fall too soon.?How much longer do we allow darkness to fall to soon? How much longer before we rise up and taste freedom, real and true freedom, how long, how long?.

Well Jesus said that those who harm child or cause children to be harmed should have a millstone tied around their necks and cast into the deepest ocean.

The Catholic Church moved abusers to fresher pastures where more children were harmed. Those others who covered up abuse, and facilitated abusers were promoted. Cardinal Bernard Law who facilitated the harm of many children in Boston was promoted to Archpriest and here in Ireland the Torpedo Man for Ratzinger forced children, who had been raped by clergy colleague Fr Brendan Smyth – to take oaths of secrecy only 30 yards from Dundalk Garda Station. Sean Brady wouldn’t even walk 30 yards to protect children – and the oath forced on those children meant Smyth had 18 more years of raping and torturing children.

Well said, Andrew.

Didn’t Ratzinger at one point say basically he wanted a more hardline smaller church? He’s going the right way about it, alienate anyone remotely liberal.
Though I class myself atheist I grew up C of I and it was a really good, healthy, warm environment. To misquote Nick Cave I don’t believe in an interventionist god, but if I did I’d totally hang out with those guys.

Alice – Fr D’Arcy can still help your brother and write the types of articles that you linked to. There is no problem with that.

However, when it comes to articles which seek to undermine the teachings of the Church, he cannot continue to do this and remain a priest in good standing. This is not very much to ask.

AlMar, I am aware of the nature of his censorship. I merely posted a link to that article as a means of showing my personal appreciation for his journalistic works over the years. I recall sitting through one of his sermons a few years back where he utterly condemned child sex abuse, the churches response and was almost in tears recounting a story of someone he had tried to help who had been the victim of abuse at the hands of a priest. He should be allowed to openly say that the Churches response to findings of abuse has been inadequate because that is the complete truth.

Almar
It’s sad really when you think beyond the obvious. Here’s a clergyman who has the hearts of the people, but yet they and him can’t break the shackles of the Roman Church. It’s like watching lions in the circus, pacing back and forth, up and down. Freedom within inches but years of captivity means that they would chose stay in their cage even if the door was thrown open. The lion tamer throws a scrap of food then prods with a stick – classic training techniques.

Alice – Fr D’Arcy remains free to say that the response to abuse was inadequate. Sure that’s what the pope himself has said.

John – even though we normally disagree, perhaps there is something in your analogy of the lion.
I cannot understand why so many priests who so obviously want to turn the Catholic Church into the Church of Ireland don’t just go and join the Church of Ireland. It would be a more honest position.

AlMar
I respect your beliefs and admire you for coming onto these threads to state your case – many don’t. I do think we have something in common.
My mother got very upset when I was young and chose to leave the Roman Church. I thought it was best left to those that believe and understand rather than it be plagued by those that remain and resent it’s ways.

Seos: Every single one of the priests who have been in the news recently are members of religious congregations. They are not the same as your local parish priest.

This means that they have taken a vow of obedience and of poverty. The obedience part means that they accept the restrictions placed on them; the poverty part means that they don’t “earn a living” as you put it. They knew what they were doing when they signed up to these vows.

I assume you are similarly outraged whenever a politicians loses the party whip after even one incident of rebellion, never mind three decades of it?

We mustn’t forget either that Ratzinger swore an oath of obedience to Adolf Hitler himself.

Almar,
If more politicians followed their conscience at the expense of losing the whip we would all be in a better place. The same can be applied to the church.

I can’t understand all the red flags on this comment, are some of you so utterly out of touch with public sentiment that you can’t see the wood for the trees anymore? Andrew Brennan is absolutely right. There hasn’t been any resignations and there should have been hundreds. Would you wake up the lot of you!!!

@Edward It’s par for the course really. One Catholic blog, supporting the censure of D’Arcy and the other priests who show some humanity, saw no problem in a comment that seemed to be advocating the murder of priests like D’Arcy. The comment was suggesting that if you shoot the leaders … the rest of these humane priests would disperse. The blog said the comment was only a ‘figure of speech’, but the comment was made in support of an organisation that physically and sexually tortured thousands of Irish children.

There’s no doubt in my mind that if I advocated the shooting of Ratzinger and his cardinals – in order to deter those other senior clerics from facilitating the physical and sexual torture of children – there would be a hue and cry from these people the like of which you’ve never seen before.

Andrew Brennan
I’m a bit late coming onto this discussion thread. I fully support your comment.

Fr Brian. I think the time is right for an orthodox Celtic church. Rome is as corrupt now as the day Martin Luther protested against indulgences and corrupt priests. The writing is on the wall. They broke the unwritten commandment. Thou shall not defile your children.

Attention seeking here by Fr Trendy, if you are part of the club you must abide by the rules , he has had more than his fair share of comment over the years without affecting his status and to be honest took a very middle of the road approach with his criticisim on many issues , if he is not happy leave and serve god in another way or with another church, now its all about self pity and poor me when the real victims of the catholic churches injustice have suffered much more,get on with your life Darcy, get off your high pulpit and get real and less of the poor me please there are a lot more worse off than you

Andrew, you are letting your anger damage your worthy cause, total transparency should be given by religious orders for what happened in the past, but taking pot shots against Priests like Fr Darcy will not achieve that.

@Val It’s not a potshot at D’Arcy himself – but at the culture and system he is embedded in. D’Arcy himself is seen as ineffably bland and not apt to foment change. He’s a nice guy, popular amongst other priests – probably other priests would like to regard themselves as being like him … nice, safe and bland.

Hasn’t D’Arcy learnt anything from recent happenings … where a ‘nice, safe and bland’ guy shook the nation with a stirring and angry speech?

D’Arcy has the same capability as the Taoiseach (a Taoiseach whom I’ve slagged off unmercifully in the past) to shake the system he is a part of. Change to the hierarchy in Ireland has to come from within – and he and a few other clerics have the power to foment change.

Sometimes ‘nice guys’ come out on top.

Tom that is very likely a coincidence, yes he was a member of the Hitler Youth and he manned anti aircraft batteries during the war. He did the same as most of his peers did during that period and there was nothing exceptional or “evil” in what he did.

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing” – Edmund Burke.

Tom he was mid teens when the war ended.

Almar
You know your right! My ole Dad had a saying. ”If yer goin’ to join the army yer gotta wear the boots”. I think Mr. D’Arcy should take his ‘emotion’ to a further level and chuck his collar in the fire.

He could do worse! They are very tolerant, they might take him in.

Joan
Around the time that I defected from the Roman Church a friend took the decision to put different string to his bow and join the Church of Ireland. My cynical response to this was that he was jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire to which he replied that he now considered he had a better chance of rising from the ashes!

What’s wrong with women priests? Seems to be working out fine for C of E and C of I. I really don’t understand what the nature of one’s genitalia has to do with their ability to minister to their flock.

Its not just that easy, the differences extend much deeper than women priest and married clergy, to be honest they are just window dressing topics.
For a Catholic to convert to Protestantism the core of their beliefs would have to change I.e. the transubstantiation of the body and blood of Christ and the virginity of Mary.
Hence what would be required is a new church with theologically identical beliefs, but a different management structure. This has happened before with the Roman, Greek and Russian Orthodox churches, all all cross comparable (e.g. Roman Catholics can receive communion in Greek Orthodox churches) but are structured differently.

@Paddy Not all protestants reject the virginity of Mary – most mainstream protestant churches accept this doctrine and that’s why Anglicans and others refer to her as the Blessed Virgin Mary.

I don’t know of any mainstream Protestant denomination that rejects the virginity of Mary, especially at the time she became pregnant with Jesus.

After that however, it’s fair game…as the Bible says she had other children and that Mary and Joseph waited till Jesus was born before they “knew” each other ;)

Just sayin’

Also, No non Orthodox Christian can receive Communion in an Orthodox Church unless it’s an Eastern Church that is in communion with Rome…in which case, it isn’t really part of the Orthodox Church any longer.