Winds of change are here, insists Tánaiste as Gilmore gale engulfs Higgins

DÁIL SKETCH:THE DÁIL'S once great fear of a belt of a crozier has been replaced by a cross-party demand for Vatican accountability on how the Catholic Church runs its affairs in the Republic.

This was evident in the House yesterday when Minister for Foreign Affairs Eamon Gilmore confirmed he would meet the papal nuncio later to discuss issues arising from the Cloyne report, which was roundly condemned.

Gilmore noted that in addition to being a church authority, it was also a state enjoying diplomatic relations with the Republic.

It was a long way from the deference once shown by the Dáil to the Vatican.

A predecessor of Gilmore’s, William Norton, joined the then taoiseach John A Costello and fellow ministers in the 1948 government in sending a fawning telegram to the pope after taking office in 1948.

It expressed a desire “to repose at the feet of Your Holiness the assurance of our filial loyalty and our devotion to your August Person, as well as our firm resolve to be guided in all our work by the teaching of Christ and to strive for the attainment of social order in Ireland based on Christian principles”.

Yesterday’s comments from our current legislators were a world away from the tone set by most of their predecessors over decades.

Labour TD Aodhán Ó Ríordáin said the Catholic Church still had a vice-grip on many of the State’s institutions. He said if the Dáil was serious about breaking the link between church and State, it should dispense with the practice of saying a prayer at the start of proceedings.

Joe Higgins, of the Socialist Party, who spent some time in a seminary in the United States in the 1960s, pointed to the role played by Bishop John Magee.

He was at the heart of the report, as he had been at the heart of Vatican bureaucracy for so long, said Higgins.

Perhaps, he suggested, that might explain the “Omerta-like code of silence” surrounding the protection of abusers.

While Higgins received a positive response from Gilmore on the Cloyne report, they clashed when Higgins said there should be an order of business in today’s special Dáil sitting.

Higgins also wanted Taoiseach Enda Kenny and Gilmore in the House to answer questions about the betrayal of promises made by them. If Gilmore was in the same humour when he met the papal nuncio, there must have been an edge to the conversation that was felt all the way to the Vatican.

Rounding on Higgins, he accused him of being so preoccupied with his litany of “olagón” that he could not see change when it happened.

For the first time, the Dáil was sitting past the first week in July, and it would sit until the end of next week, while it would deal with legislative matters today.

“So, Deputy Higgins, change is happening, sorry to disappoint you,” said Gilmore.

Fianna Fáil TDs, normally eager to criticise the Government, remained silent, knowing their party’s contribution to Dáil reform during their 14 years in power was a blank page.