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	Fergus Finlay: It's about Time That We Questioned the Value of Expensive Vatican Embassy By Fergus Finlay The Herald July 20, 2011 http://www.herald.ie/opinion/fergus-finlay-its-about-time-that-we-questioned-the-value-of-expensive-vatican-embassy-2826414.html So, today the Dail is debating a motion that deplores the role of the Vatican in relation to the whole Cloyne affair. Meanwhile, the Tanaiste is still waiting for answers to a series of questions he posed to the Papal Nuncio. He wants the Vatican to explain its role, formally and in detail. Well, it's beginning to look as if the Tanaiste, and Ireland, might have got our answer. It's all a misunderstanding, apparently, a storm in a teacup. That's not the Nuncio's formal reply, but it's the net effect of a statement quoted in today's papers from the senior spokesman for the Vatican, Fr Federico Lombardi. Avoid The good Father, speaking on Vatican Radio, managed to avoid making any reference to Bishop Magee, or the damage that had been done to children and families by priests under Magee's supervision, or the effective cover-up orchestrated on Magee's watch. This cover-up happened, let's remember, despite the introduction of much stricter church guidelines by the Irish church in the mid-1990s. And the cover-up was facilitated by the Vatican's reaction to those stricter guidelines. What the Vatican did, back in 1997, was to send a letter reacting to the Irish Church's new guidelines, which included a form of compulsory or mandatory reporting. That letter said "the situation of mandatory reporting gives rise to serious reservations of both a moral and a canonical nature" -- and it was essentially that tone that was used by people who had no interest in reporting child abuse. It was used to hide behind -- and that was the point the Cloyne Report was making when they said the Vatican's letter was "entirely unhelpful to any bishop who wanted to implement the agreed procedures". But we've all just misunderstood the situation, it seems. All those hysterical commentators in Ireland who think the Vatican was encouraging people to break the law of the land and shelter child abusers have got it totally wrong, according to Father Lombardi. All they were doing was offering general advice, not steering anyone towards a breach of the law. Is this really the best that the Holy See can do? Is this really the best result diplomacy can produce? If it is, you really would wonder what the point of diplomacy is, wouldn't you? I've always been someone who believes in the power of diplomacy, particularly over time. Diplomacy made a powerful contribution to peace on this island, often against overwhelming odds. Damaging But diplomacy is a two-way street, and it has to be based on mutual respect. Diplomacy that is based on obsequiousness in one direct, and lofty disdain in the other, is more than meaningless, it's damaging and corrosive. In our case, of course, it's also expensive. We're maintaining two separate diplomatic establishments in Rome, and we're according special status to the Vatican diplomat who lives here. Our relations with the Vatican aren't 'normal' in any sense, and it's impossible to see what value they serve right now. Sometimes diplomats recognise the value of a short sharp shock. We may not want to sever our diplomatic ties with the Vatican entirely, but it's time we made them work. And it's time the Vatican recognised that no one in Ireland is going to put up with their patronising nonsense any longer.
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