The Catholic Diocese of Clogher is standing over its decision to order a Co Fermanagh widow to exhume the body of her late husband today or face a High Court action.
Teresa O'Connor has been told to remove the body of her husband, Vincent, from a graveyard next to their parish church where he was buried on December 28th last in defiance of a court injunction which was taken out by Bishop Joseph Duffy.
In a letter to her solicitors, lawyers for the church set a deadline of Good Friday for the body to be exhumed.
Failure to meet this deadline would result in an application being made to the High Court "to enforce the consequences of your clients' contempt of court", the letter of March 4th read.
Ms O'Connor said: "We feel persecuted at this stage. But we're going to fight on. This is what Vin would have wanted. I have to fight his corner because he is not here now."
The row erupted after Mr O'Connor's sudden death on Christmas Eve, aged 63, from complications following a hernia operation. His family had wanted to bury his body on a plot that had been donated by a local resident for the purposes of a graveyard next to St Michael's Church, Mulleek, near Belleek.
The church had got planning permission for a graveyard at the site but subsequently changed its plans, opting for a new cemetery three miles away, leaving the original plot for a church car park.
The diocese said it informed parishioners of this decision as early as May 2003.
However, the O'Connors said they only learned of the decision on the eve of the funeral, when they were served with the injunction against trespassing on the Muleek plot.
According to Ms O'Connor, the family was subsequently barred from the funeral Mass, and had to watch her husband's remains being interred from the roadside.
Speaking to The Irish Times yesterday from the same roadside location, Ms O'Connor said she had been unable to visit the grave because of fear over the injunction. "They could take our home if we break it."
Her husband's grave - decorated with flowers and a cross reading "Rest in Peace" - stood at the bottom of the yard which was developed with money from the local community in defiance of the church's wishes.
Mr O'Connor's brother, Liam, noted: "We have not had a chance to grieve. It's all been about the graveyard, and our loss has been forgotten."
Ms O'Connor admitted the church had offered them a number of plots in the existing church graveyard on the day of the funeral but, she said, none was suitable.
"We wanted a double grave," she said. "We were married 26½ years, and we wanted to have a double grave."
She remarked that the church had added insult to injury by giving them a deadline of Good Friday to exhume the body. The family claim the plot has been consecrated, despite denials from the diocese.
In their letter to the O'Connors, solicitors for the diocese said that by meeting the deadline, the family would obviate "the need for further potentially distressing proceedings".
Bishop Duffy's secretary, Fr Liam McDaid, said he was not familiar with the content of the correspondence between the solicitors.
But he said he "would be very surprised if that date was chosen by the bishop".
Fr McDaid added: "The bishop made what he thought was the best decision for the parish - to develop the cemetery three miles away. Some of the locals were not happy with that, and this burial took place in contravention of a court injunction.
"That is what has created this difficult situation.
"Naturally the bishop is anxious to avoid causing distress to anyone. He doesn't want to be in dispute with anyone. If there was a solution, he would be delighted to find one," said Fr McDaid.