UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail
I’m so glad my secret is out, says affair shame bishop: Roman Catholic priest talks of feeling liberated as church chiefs are accused of ‘knowing for years’
By PAUL BENTLEY
A leading bishop who has resigned in shame over an affair said last night that he was ‘relieved’ the secret was out.
Kieran Conry, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Arundel and Brighton, confessed on Saturday to being an ‘unfaithful’ priest.
He also stands accused of a second affair with a married parishioner 20 years his junior, who spent at least three nights at his home.
Last night, Catholic Church leaders were accused of a cover-up, with a lawyer saying they have ‘known for years that the bishop has been having affairs’.
Bishop Conry, 63, said he felt ‘liberated’ knowing he no longer has to bear the burden of his guilt alone.
‘It has been difficult keeping the secret,’ he told the Mail. ‘In some respects I feel very calm. It is liberating. It is a relief. I have been very careful not to make sexual morality a priority [in his sermons]. I don’t think it got in the way of my job, I don’t think people would say I have been a bad bishop. But I can’t defend myself. I did wrong. Full stop.’
Bishop Conry – a leading religious figure close to Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the head of the Church in England and Wales – became a bishop in 2001.
He is sworn to celibacy and has for years preached about the Church’s ‘moral authority’ and the importance of the sanctity of family life.
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