State elected bishops may not be odd

WE would surely think it very odd if President Mary McAleese, after consultation with the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, was empowered to appoint Bishops of the Catholic Church in Ireland.

Mind you, were we to have such a process, the quality of episcopal appointments might improve considerably, but that must remain a purely speculative matter.

It used to be claimed by the late Dr Noel Browne, among others that the Ireland of the 1950s was a theocracy, a society in which the real power is exercised by bishops and priests. In defence of Dr Browne, it should be said that some high clerics and a few low clerics lectured the populace at large and generally behaved as though we did indeed live in a theocracy.