Auxiliary Bishops Had Very Little Power, Irish Independent, December 29, 2009

Auxiliary Bishops Had Very Little Power

Irish Independent
December 29, 2009

http://www.independent.ie/opinion/letters/auxiliary-bishops-had-very-little-power-1991634.html

FOUR of the bishops who served as auxiliaries in the Archdiocese of Dublin during the period covered by the Murphy report have now resigned.

At least three of the four had at first asserted that they were not personally responsible for what happened, and as such they considered that they should not resign. But then Archbishop Martin introduced the notion of collective authority and, as a consequence, collective responsibility, for the failures of the time.

This seems to have tipped the scale, and as of now, all but Bishop Martin Drennan are gone. This is an interesting development, which to my knowledge is unique in the recent history of the Catholic Church.

I know that bishops are independent in their own diocese, and answerable directly to Rome.What precisely the position of auxiliary bishops is I am not sure. Collective responsibility is an idea taken from the secular, not the religious, world.

It is associated with democracy, and with the workings of a democratic government, made up of a taoiseach or prime minister and a number of ministers, forming a cabinet. The understanding is that, even in areas where the individual ministers are not directly involved, when a decision is made by the cabinet each one takes collective responsibility for that decision.

My understanding was that auxiliary bishops, particularly in Dublin, had little or no say over policy and decision making. In fact, I have often heard it said that during the reign of the archbishops covered in the Murphy report, the auxiliaries had about as much power as the altar servers.

If I am right, then the notion of collective responsibility surely cannot apply. A person cannot be responsible for something over which he had little or no influence.

Now that people's reputations are being seriously damaged, would it be possible to hear from one of these former auxiliaries as to what exactly was their input into decision making in the Archdiocese of Dublin? Did they really exercise collective authority in decision making, and do they feel that it is just and right that the notion of collective responsibility be applied to them?