IRELAND
National Catholic Reporter
by Eugene Cullen Kennedy | Jan. 25, 2013
The Irish Redemptorist Fr. Tony Flannery refuses to meet the Vatican demand that he affirm, among other things, that “Christ instituted the church with a permanent hierarchical structure and that bishops are divinely appointed successors to the apostles.”
Flannery, a popular preacher and writer, told The New York Times he has been “writing thought-provoking articles and books for decades without hindrance” and that the campaign against him “is being orchestrated by a secretive body that refuses to meet me. Surely I should at least be allowed to explain my views to my accusers.”
Flannery also organized the Association of Catholic Priests in 2009 to articulate the views of rank-and-file members of the clergy, the Times reports. Flannery may have gotten himself investigated as much for giving Irish priests a voice as for using his own in challenging old-fashioned formulations with his well-informed knowledge of theology and history.
If Father Flannery is being asked to endorse the notion that Jesus established the hierarchical church and that the bishops are the divinely appointed successors of the apostles, one might be more concerned about how firm a grasp his accusers have on modern theology.
This incident is an early 21st-century reprise of the early 20th-century Roman worldwide crackdown on priests who were keeping up with the new advances in theological and scriptural studies. All priests were forced to take the Oath Against Modernism, the vague catch-all phrase that supposedly summarized the heresies rampant in the new learning.
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