But few concessions can be offered over concerns at the loss of
But few concessions can be offered over concerns at the loss of European cash: in 2006 Ireland, which has received six times as much from Europe as it has put in since it joined in 1973, will lose eligibility to the lucrative structural and cohesion funds which will be directed at poorer east European nations entering the EU. The complaint on abortion is based on the text of Europe's Charter of Fundamental Rights which, though proclaimed at Nice, is outside the treaty."We are convinced that the Irish politicians and the EU will do their best to explain and demonstrate to the Irish voters before the next referendum the benefits coming from the enlargement," said the Hungary's foreign ministry spokesman, Gabor Horvath.The Polish foreign ministry added that it was confident "that the EU driven by a feeling of responsibility and solidarity will find a solution that will allow the Nice Treaty to come into force and create the structural framework for enlargement".The EU is supposed to have its legislation ready by the end of 2002 but the first enlargement is not expected before 2004. In a joint statement, the President of the European Commission, Romano Prodi, and Goran Persson, the Prime Minister of Sweden, which holds the EU presidency, promised to work to find "a way forward" that did not involve "changing the substance of the Nice Treaty".. Irish police have arrested four people and uncovered bomb-making equipment in a renewed drive against dissident republican paramilitary groups, including the Real IRA. Irish police have arrested four people and uncovered bomb-making equipment in a renewed drive against dissident republican paramilitary groups, including the Real IRA. A woman was detained in the centre of Dublin and three men were arrested after their car was stopped near the border town of Dundalk, Co Louth.The men were the first to be arrested by the Irish police's anti-terrorist Emergency Response Unit and it is understood that explosives were found in the vehicle.Later in the day, officers discovered timing power units while arresting the woman, who is in her 30s, in Dublin.All four were being held under Ireland's Offences Against the State Act, an anti-terror law that permits suspects to be kept in custody for up to 72 hours before being either charged or released.
The woman was questioned in a police station in the capital.Two of the men detained in Co Louth, both from Dublin, were also being quizzed at a police base in the capital. The third man, from Dundalk, was being questioned by detectives in Ashbourne, Co Meath.The police activity was believed to be directed at the Real IRA, which has been responsible for a number of bombings in Britain and Northern Ireland, and carried out the 1998 bomb attack in Omagh, Co Tyrone, which killed 29 people.Police were on alert for action by the group during the UK general election campaign.The Dundalk arrests were made by the Emergency Response Unit, working with local Garda Siochana officers.. A Roman Catholic nun who has been banned by the Vatican from continuing her work with homosexuals is to defy Rome by speaking out on the issue and attacking the Church's "out of date" values at a meeting in London today. A Roman Catholic nun who has been banned by the Vatican from continuing her work with homosexuals is to defy Rome by speaking out on the issue and attacking the Church's "out of date" values at a meeting in London today. Sister Jeannine Gramick, an American nun who has run counselling sessions for homosexual men and women, has been forbidden to continue such ministry because she refused to condemn those in her pastoral care. The Vatican also ordered her to refrain from speaking about her work and the Church's ban on it.Sister Jeannine had worked with Catholic gays and lesbians for more than 20 years when she was told to stop following a 12-year investigation by the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican's modern-day successor to the Inquisition.According to Sister Jeannine, the Vatican and her religious order have asked her to "silence myself".
She said: "After finding my voice to tell my story, I choose not to collaborate in my own oppression by restricting a basic human right. To me it is a matter of conscience."Sister Jeannine and a priest, Robert Nugent, ran workshops and retreats for homosexual men and women in the US. But after a complaint by a cardinal, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith began an inquiry into their work. After a series of interrogations, it claimed that the pair had allowed "errors and ambiguities" into discussions on Catholic teaching on homosexuality. The congregation said that the two had not sufficiently emphasised church teaching that homosexual acts are "intrinsically disordered."Church teaching decrees that only procreative sex within marriage is acceptable, and rejects any other sexual activity. This means that any physical expression of homosexuality is not allowed, although the Church stresses that being homosexual is not intrinsically wrong.
According to Sister Jeannine, its views are out of date and many homosexuals she has worked with find them extremely distressing. "They are traumatised because there is no option for them."The severity with which Sister Jeannine and Father Nugent were dealt with shocked many within the Church. Sister Jeannine, 59, who has been a nun since she was 18, was also told by her order, the Sisters of Notre Dame, that she must not speak of her work or ordeal. But she has flown to London to speak at a meeting at St Anne's Church in Soho, organised by a variety of radical Catholic organisations including several pressure groups urging the Church to change its stance on homosexuality, women's ordination and married priests. Her talk coincides with the publication of a book on the modern-day Inquisition.The move to silence Sister Jeannine follows a series of bans on critics of the Church during the papacy of John Paul II.
The consistently conservative Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, run by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, one of the most feared men in the Vatican, has excommunicated many theologians for their views on homosexuality, women priests, divorce, and the Virgin Mary.Among those who have suffered are the theologian Hans Kung, who has criticised the Church's teaching on contraception and celibacy, and the BBC Radio 4 broadcaster Sister Lavinia Byrne, whose book on women and the priesthood was ordered to be pulped.While the Pope has in recent years issued apologies for the Church's past misdemeanours, including its treatment of Jews and of Galileo, and its conduct of the Crusades, it continues to criticise homosexuals.Last year the Pope said that the World Pride Festival in Rome was an offence to the Christian values of the city, and Scotland's Cardinal Thomas Winning was among the most vociferous opponents of the repeal of Section 28, which bars teaching on homosexuality in schools. Yet a recent Channel Four documentary alleged that the majority of men currently training to be Catholic priests are homosexual, and that a gay subculture is emerging in seminaries.The inquiry into Sister Jeannine and Father Nugent began after the Vatican said it received many complaints from American bishops and others into what the pair were saying about homosexuality. Their critics claimed that their views were ambiguous and erroneous.In 1988 the Vatican created a commission into whether the pair had moved outside Church teaching. They were regularly summoned to interviews about their work, and told to attend investigations into their thinking. Sister Jeannine always refused to discuss her personal views on homosexuality, and insisted that she did follow Church teaching by stressing that the Catechism rejected homosexual acts, but emphasised that gays and lesbians should be treated with "respect, compassion and dignity".Sister Jeannine has complied with the order by no longer working with homosexuals, although she says that it would be most beneficial for them to be included and welcomed in the Catholic community."Opinions among the Catholic laity have changed," she said. "There has been a shift in belief away from traditional teaching on same-sex relationships. Half the Catholics in the pews say gay people should be able to express love sexually.