Tony Flannery

Tomorrow morning (Sunday 16th) I fly out to Chicago to participate in the 3rd International Conference of the network of Church Reform Organisations.
I am really looking forward to it. It is a participative conference, confined to leaders or representatives of reform groups. There are forty one people attending, which is about the maximum that can be managed in a participative gathering, with no formal presentations. I know most of the people, men and women, who are coming, and they constitute a really interesting group of people.

I am glad to see that Archbishop Joe Tobin of Indianapolis has been chosen as one of the men to be made a cardinal by Pope Francis.
Joe was superior general of the Redemptorists for a good while, and he did a good job. He is enlightened and clear thinking, with a definite liberal streak to him. After he completed his time with us he was put into the position of second-in-command of the Congregation for Religious in the Vatican.

A few days ago, around mid morning, I was getting ready to celebrate Mass with a friend of mine. I had all the necessities laid out, the books opened and the candles lit, when my phone rang. Somebody was calling to tell me that a letter had arrived at a Redemptorist house for me. I asked him to open it and tell me what it contained. It was from the Civil Registration Service, telling me that I was no longer on the approved list of marriage solemnisers.