DESIGNED as territories of spiritual and temporal
control, Ireland’s diocesan structures date from the Synod of Kells in
1152.
The bishop was a spiritual ‘capo’ and a lord who ruled.
The diocesan structure dispersed trained personnel to the remotest parishes. The confessional and the pulpit policed public debate and private morals. Prelates, like McHale of Tuam, Croke of Cashel and McQuaid of Dublin, were powers in the land. The antiphon ‘Ecce sacerdos magnus, qui in diebus suis, placuit Deo’, meaning, "behold the great priest, who in his days, pleased God", was the magnificent liturgical salute to a bishop on great occasions.
We had no royalty and a rag-tag aristocracy that enjoyed little affection and less respect, so these successors to the apostles were the princely representatives of a spiritual realm that rivalled the British Empire.
Episcopal dignity cascaded down upon a kneeling nation.
Of 26 Catholic dioceses, four — Kildare and Leighlin, Cloyne, Derry, and Limerick — are vacant.
Three bishops — Murphy of Kerry, Jones of Elphin, and O’Reilly of Ardagh and Clonmacnoise — are over 75, the canonical age of retirement. Four — Cork and Ross, Clonfert, and the Archbishops of Cashel and Armagh — are within two years of retirement.
Eleven of Ireland’s 26 Catholic dioceses are either sede vacante or soon will be.
The vacant sede (seat), the bishop’s throne, is the symbol of episcopal authority.
This opportunity to remake the hierarchy follows its reputational implosion. Ireland never counted with the Vatican in the way popular sentiment here supposed, but it was a fertile ground for vocations.
Just as the great European powers sought their place in the sun, the Catholic Church established a missionary empire from the cities of North America to the furthest reaches of the Far East. Irish clergy were the foot soldiers, and occasionally generals, in the Pope’s army.
When Pope John Paul II arrived at Dublin airport in September 1979, appropriately in an Indian summer, he saluted ‘Hibernia semper fidelis’, ‘Ireland always faithful’. The allegiance of the remotest parish in the most obscure Irish diocese went all the way to Rome.
An official papal delegation or visitation, to investigate every aspect of the Irish Church, and a new papal nuncio, are part of a determined programme of reform and repair. At 53, the nuncio Charles John Brown is a stripling, but a well-rooted one. He worked for a decade for Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger in the powerful Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith.
The nuncio, and the prefect of the Congregation of Bishops, Cardinal Ouellet, will advise the Pope in choosing the new leaders of the Irish church.
Having been part of the visitation and then papal legate to the recent Eucharistic Congress, the Canadian cardinal will be well-briefed on Ireland.
Life has moved on since the Synod of Kells and it is probable that smaller dioceses will be merged, so the scarce resources of priests can be better used and services such as child protection can be shared.
In Mayo, Killala and Achonry might be combined.
The issue of two incumbent bishops could be solved by transferring Bishop Fleming, of Killala, to his native, vacant diocese of Limerick.
The soon-to-be-vacant Clonfert could be merged with Galway or Tuam.
A vacant Cloyne could be merged with a soon-to-be-vacant Cork and Ross.
Whatever is decided, it is certain that an unsustainable, extensive structure will not remain intact.
With nearly half of all sees to be filled over the next two years, there is intense clerical speculation on who will be chosen.
The known vacancies do not include a transfer out of Dublin for Archbishop Diarmuid Martin. His media reputation belies an authoritarian attitude to his priests, many of whom see little evidence in private of the humbler, more open Church he calls for in public.
It may be that tolerating one another in this world is the penance that a prelate and his priests must pay to prepare for the next.
Bishop Noel Treanor, of Down and Connor, is a leading contender to succeed Cardinal Brady, a man believed to be painfully conscious of his own mistakes, at Armagh.
Father Timothy Bartlett, a priest of Down and Connor and an adviser to the Cardinal in Armagh, is potentially an auxiliary bishop in either diocese.
Known as ‘Dr Sin’ for his book on the subject, Dromore priest and president of Maynooth, Msgr Hugh Connolly, is also a potential auxiliary at Armagh or replacement if a vacancy arose in Down and Connor.
Still in the ecclesial province of Armagh, Dunboyne parish priest and former president of St Patrick’s College in Maynooth, Msgr Dermot Farrell, is a potential successor in Ardagh and Clonmacnoise.
Msgr Eamon Martin, former secretary to the Bishop of Derry, and now administrator of that vacant diocese, is spoken of there.
If Bishop Fleming, of Killala, is not returned to his native Limerick, Father Tony Mullins may be asked. He has been an impressive spokesman in public debate.
Father Michael Drumm, a brother of the former HSE CEO and chair of the Catholic Schools Partnership, is tipped for his native Elphin.
In Cloyne, Father Bill Birmingham is highly regarded.
Revd Prof Seamus O’Connell, of Maynooth, or Fr Donal O’Neil are both spoken of for Kerry.
Msgr Paul Tighe, secretary of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications in Rome, a Dublin priest in favour with Archbishop Martin, is mentioned as an auxiliary for him in Dublin.
After consulting locally, the nuncio sends a terna, a list of three candidates, to the Vatican. In that opaque world, multiple influences are brought to bear and few are discernible.
What is certain is that the new bishops are inheriting a crumbling edifice. The challenge they face is less opposition and more indifference.
Regaining traction in a changed society will be an enormous challenge.