Item one: Fr. Tom Doyle recently penned an open letter to and about Voice of the Faithful--to which VOTF Board Chair Bill Casey responded. The exchange is not exactly a lovefest. I'd post Doyle's letter here, but it is long. You can read it at Voices in the Desert (scroll to the bottom of the post; the blogmaster has highlighted certain sections of the letter). Casey's letter can be found in the most recent VOTF newsletter.Item two: The former archbishop of Dublin, Cardinal Desmond Connell, is suing to prevent the current archbishop, Diarmuid Martin, from releasing archdiocesan documents related to clergy sexual abuse. So that's unusual. The Irish Times has the story.

The cardinal claims the documents in question are legally privileged and his lawyers today secured an interim High Court injunction restraining the Commission from examining the documents to decide whether they attract legal privilege and/or a duty of confidentiality.The proceedings arise from an order by the Commission last December compelling Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, as the current Archbishop of Dublin, to produce to the Commission all documents listed by him in an affidavit of discovery of June 2006. That affidavit listed documents dating from 1975 to 2004 relating to claims of child abuse against a representative sample of 46 priests in the Dublin Archdiocese.Archbishop Martin delivered the documents in disc format on January 15th last and the Commission had indicated it intended to begin examining the documents from Monday last to decide whether they are, as Cardinal Connell claims, legally privileged or subject to a duty of confidentiality.The Commission has refused a request from Cardinal Connell's solicitor not to begin that examination process pending the outcome of the Cardinal's legal action, Mr Roddy Horan SC, for Cardinal Connell, told the High Court.

John Cooney of the Irish Independent has more on the what the legal dispute means.(N.B.--Keep the comments civil.)

Grant Gallicho joined Commonweal as an intern and was an associate editor for the magazine until 2015. 

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