The Monsignor appears ignorant of the vast irony of his assertion that priests bring Christ 'in a personal way and in a sacramental way' into the scope of lived experience, especially given the myriad unsurprising pedophiliac moments and events that have emerged despite the Roman church's reported efforts to hide beneath a vestment of invisibility offenses know to it.
While it is obvious from the Monsignor's sermon that he sincerely is dedicated to his religion and his church, it is also obvious that his concern over further cheapening 'the complexity of what we face' by addressing it directly, is informed more by the frail and morally defensive position he has adopted than by a passion for giving witness to the suffering wrought by the vile violations of broken trust and the shattering of lives prompted by his offending brothers' ministry of vulnerable boys.
I am sure that I am not alone in believing that their 'way' was at once too personal and too void of grace.I have no doubt that there is a spiritual weeping and gnashing of teeth among ecclesiasticals almost to a man as well as among the householders who are the church's faithful.
I am certain that the suffering caused by some brothers is anguishing for the rest of the family. But I am equally certain that until Monsignor Drennan and his brothers publicly confess and apologise without qualification for the abuses committed by office bearers of their institution, the child protection policies and procedures of which he is perversely so proud are merely ink on paper and not yet good news.
