Madam, - The diocese of Kildare and Leighlin has announced that a former Catholic priest is returning to the ministry 37 years after he was laicised (Irish Times, December 12th).
Fr Michael Moloney (67) was ordained in 1966 but three years later applied to leave the priesthood and in 1972 married his late wife.
He had four grown-up children and two grandchildren and has been appointed as a curate in the Kildare and Leighlin diocese.
So where does that leave the ordained class of 1966, specifically the ones who stayed in their vocations, struggled with their celibacy, most likely fell in love but remained true to their vocations?
Guys, you should have taken a 37-year sabbatical, you should have gone off with that woman you most probably met and fell in love with soon after you entered parish ministry and married her, or if celibacy was too much of a burden but you still really wanted to be a priest, joined the Anglican church, had your family and then ask to be readmitted to the Catholic Church.
Compulsory celibacy is clearly not intrinsic to the priesthood and this is being regularly demonstrated by the church itself by the wholesale admittance of Anglican priests into the Catholic Church in the UK, complete with wife and kids.
Fair play to Fr Moloney and I wish him well in his new role, but it is perfectly clear that the only reason why Fr Michael Moloney couldn't be a priest before now was because he had a loving wife. Now that the woman is gone to her eternal reward, the Catholic Church is prepared to let Fr Michael Moloney practise as a priest, and his parishioners will benefit from his decades of experience as a husband, father, lover. Would he be any less of a priest with his wife at his side? Of course not.
The church proclaims that it defends the fundamental value of women in the church and yet a man has to leave the priesthood if he finds love with a woman but can be readmitted to his priesthood once that woman is no longer on the scene, even if he has been away for decades and has children and grandchildren.
It seems to me that the "problem" is the woman, which really says it all about celibate clericalism.
Is it any wonder than few men want to become priests when they see the priesthood being undermined by such double standards? - Yours, etc,