Tony Flannery

This is a review of my latest book, From the Outside, and of some of my earlier works, by Eamon Maher.

It is published in the March/April issue of the Dominican publication, Spirituality.

From the Inside to the Margins: Tracing a Priest’s Fall from Grace

EAMON MAHER

I first met Tony Flannery in 1976 when I was a student in Cistercian College Roscrea. The Redemptorists came to give us a retreat which I reckon they may have found somewhat challenging – former Taoiseach Brian Cowen was in my class and he was one of many who prided themselves on raising thorny issues of a theological or moral nature!

I was in the U.S. on my speaking tourwhen the story of the Tuam Babies, and the discovery of hundred of remains in a septic tank broke. Everywhere I went I was being questioned about it, people wondering how nuns could be so cruel and uncaring.

Since a cousin of my own was reputed to have been ‘dumped’ in that septic tank, it wasn’t a subject that I welcomed on my travels.

Anne Alhadef shared a link.

Shortly after reading Fr. Tony Flannery’s book From the Outside: Rethinking Church Doctrine (ISBN 978 1 78605 102 8) I read the 12 February 2021 Word on Fire article below. What a contrast between the two. For me the one was fearfully clinging to a misogynistic, patriarchal Church while the other was recognizing that faith is living, and therefore, changing.

   The reason for this Facebook page is that I have come to see the need for the changes Flannery outlines in his book.