Vatican’s voice not always silent on Ireland issues

When the State’s Murphy Commission of Inquiry into clerical child sex abuse in the Diocese of Cloyne asked the Papal Nuncio to Ireland, Most Rev Dr Giuseppe Leanza ‘to submit to it any information you might have about the matters under investigation’. Leanza replied that ‘the Nunciature is unable to assist’.  Leanza had treated the Inquiries of abuse in Dublin, Ferns and in industrial schools with silent contempt.

It is interesting to compare this sterile and hostile response with the dialogue which preceded the referendum to approve Bunreacht na hÉireann in 1937 before it was even put before Dáil Éireann. When the strategic interests of The Vatican are in play there is not reticence or reluctance on their part to speak vigorously.

Joseph Walshe (1886-1956) was a former Jesuit seminarian and solicitor who rose to the rank of Secretary of the Department of External Affairs from 1927 to 1946 and Ambassador to the Holy See from 1946 to 1954.

Walshe travelled to Rome in April 1937 and reported to his Minister, Éamon deValera on his discussions with Vatican apparatchiks’ about the draft Irish Constitution and particularly about Article 45 which was intended to confer State recognition on the Catholic Church (but was removed following a constitutional referendum in 1972)

Walshe’s discussions over the course of three days that month were with Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli (1876-1958), Vatican Secretary of State who was to become Pope Pius XII from 1939 to 1958. DeValera was seeking the approval of The Vatican insofar as it could be given, even though the Constitution did not completely accord with what Pacelli and Pope Pius XI considered to be ‘the complete Catholic ideal’.

Pacelli and the Pope argued that noting the ‘special position’ in Ireland of the Catholic Church in the draft Constitution  ‘had no real value so long as there was not a formal acknowledgement of the RC Church as the Church founded by Christ’. They argued that Ireland was the Catholic Country of the world and they thought that deValera should make a special effort to give to the world a completely Catholic Constitution. They stated that according to the strict teaching of the Church the advocates of the draft Constitution were heretics to recognise any church but ‘the one true Church’ – although the Church would not take an heresy too seriously.

Pacelli promised to have a long talk with the Pope and to obtain his blessing for the Irish Government. But Pope Pius XI responded with the words ‘Ni approve ni non disapprove; tacermo’ – he did not approve or disapprove and went on to maintain silence and reflect a stance of complete neutrality. Pacelli argued that ‘neutrality’ should be interpreted as a crumb of consolation insofar as the Pope went as far as he could go.

On the question of marriage which the Vatican regarded in 1937 as one of the supreme tests of the Catholicism of the State the Cardinal also said the Irish Government of the day was also heretical. Cases of matrimonial nullity and of ‘ratum et nonconsummatum’ presumes that all marriages, Catholic and non-Catholic, are valid unless canonically proven invalid and that marriages celebrated within a church in Ireland are within the exclusive domain of the Church.

References to ‘other Christian churches’ could not be formally improved but they could tolerate the word ‘Bodies’.

Eleven years earlier when Ireland was seeking to establish diplomatic relations with the Holy See when the Kingdom of Italy granted independence on 7 June 1929 under the terms of the Lateran Treaty. 

Walshe visited The Vatican in May 1929 and observed that Irish bishops were perceived by the Rome counterparts as second rate because, with the exceptions of the then Archbishop of Dublin, Dr Byrne and one other, none of them could converse in Italian.  The Irish bishops were also believed to be wanting in intellectual weight and from a cultural perspective resulting in no Catholic literature or results of Catholic learning emerging from Ireland, which it was felt ought to have been the fountain of Catholic thought in the English speaking world in 1929.  The role of the Irish State adopted to respond to this was to endeavour to get only the elite young students intellectually and culturally, sent to Rome.  Roman studies, the State considered, should become a sine qua non of any candidate qualified to become a bishop, having attended the great ecclesiastical universities of Rome.  Apart from helping the Nuncio to remind the Vatican of the Church’s duty to the State in Ireland, Irish Ministers  efforts should centre on how Ireland could ‘find her proper position in Rome’.  This was thought to be achievable if the diplomat succeeded in winning the support and goodwill of the 15 or 20 people who count in Rome and by fostering ‘friendly’, or at least ‘correct’ relations with his British counterpart so as not to be cut off from useful contacts and sources of information.

Should Ireland review diplomatic ties with The Vatican?

Why should a rain-sodden, destitute and spiritually bankrupt nation on the on the fringes of Western Europe continue to tolerate a Machiavellian and mischievous diplomat as Dean of its Diplomatic Corp when not one, but two incumbents, behaved so treacherously toward their host nation?

The sovereignty of The Holy See is captured in three treaties signed with Italy on 11 February 1929 acknowledged, among other things, the full sovereignty of the Vatican and established its territorial extent; however, the origin of the Papal States, which over the years have varied considerably in extent, may be traced back to the 8th century.

The oldest diplomatic service in the world is that of The Holy See when legates were originally essentially spiritual emissaries.  Permanent papal representatives began to appear In the mid-15th century and by the 16th century, there are records of the  establishment of apostolic nunciatures in different countries, with an exchange of representatives between those countries and the Holy See. The very first apostolic nunciature was established in Venice in 1500.

As affirmed in the Vienna Diplomatic Convention 1961 of April 18, 1961, the Holy See's ambassadors, or apostolic nuncios, are considered the deans of the diplomatic corps of the country to which they are accredited by agreement with the receiving State. The Holy See currently exchanges diplomats with 162 nations.

Canon Law 364 defines the duties of a legate: "to send information to the Apostolic See on the conditions of the particular churches ...; to assist the bishops by action and counsel, while leaving intact the exercise of the bishops' legitimate power; to foster close relationships with the conference of bishops ... ; to transmit or propose the names of candidates to the Apostolic See in reference too the naming of bishops ..."  There is precious little evidence of assisting bishops by actions and counsel in Ireland when the issue is child sex abuse.

The Vatican

Popes in their secular role ruled portions of the Italian peninsula for more than a thousand years until the mid 19th century, when many of the Papal States were seized by the newly united Kingdom of Italy. In 1870, the pope's holdings were further circumscribed when Rome itself was annexed. Disputes between a series of "prisoner" popes and Italy were resolved in 1929 by the three Lateran Treaties, which established the independent state of Vatican City and granted Roman Catholicism special status in Italy. In 1984, a concordat between the Holy See and Italy modified certain of the earlier treaty provisions, including the primacy of Roman Catholicism as the Italian state religion. Present diplomatic concerns of the Holy See include religious freedom, international development, the environment, the Middle East, China, the decline of religion in Europe, terrorism, interreligious dialogue and reconciliation, and the application of church doctrine in an era of rapid change and globalization. But their concerns do not encompass the the sodomy of Irish children by far too many priests. 

 

Diplomatic relations with Ireland

The failure of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at The Vatican to provide information to The Murphy Commission on reports of clerical child sexual abuse from 1975 to 2004 which had been conveyed to the Congregation by the Archdiocese of Dublin highlights that the Irish people of all religions, and none, have a political and a civic relationship with The Holy See that is separate from its ecclesiastical relationship with Catholics.

The decision by two incumbents' of the office of  Papal Nuncio to Ireland in 2007 and in 2009 not to forward to the Commission all documents in his passion relevant to the Commission’s terms of reference cannot be construed as other than a demonstration of contempt towards a Commission that is independent of the Government and towards the Irish people for whom cooperation was an issue of vital national importance.

There is clearly no point in Ireland pursuing a high-level, but non-productive and inert, diplomatic relationship in such circumstances. I therefore agree with the suggestion of Des O’Malley that the Irish Embassy in Italy ought to take care of whatever diplomatic business arises with The Vatican on a non-residential basis.

Dean of Diplomatic Corp

The passage of the 5^th Amendment to the Irish Constitution deleting the text conferring the recognition of the State on the 'special position of the Holy Catholic Apostolic and Roman Church as the Guardian of the Faith professed by the great majority of the citizens' on 5 January 1973 must surely challenge the practice of the Papal Nuncio continuing automatically to be the Dean of the Diplomatic Corp in this country. If it is necessary to appoint a Dean why not pursue the practice in other countries where the longest-serving ambassador fulfils this largely ceremonial role? This would ensure that this role is undertaken by a range of ambassadors over time and the Government and the people are less likely to be humiliated when the titular Head of the Diplomatic Corp chooses to ignore the authority of the State on ascertaining the truth with respect to vile criminal, carnal acts.