Cardinal William Conway, Primate of all Ireland, was supposed to attend the Eucharistic Congress in Melbourne in 1973. But events in his own back yard meant he needed to stay at home. The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Willie Whitelaw had presented him with a quandary: what to do about a priest in the diocese of Derry.
The priest was Fr James Chesney, whom the local police wanted to question about a role he was alleged to have played in a set of three explosions in the small village of Claudy at the end of the previous July. It is a mixed community of about 400 people and there did not seem to be any strategic or other reason for the attack — not that either side needed much by way of reason for what they were doing.
The police had a suspicion that Chesney was involved in the planning of the explosions which had resulted in the deaths of nine people and horrific injury to many others.
Conscious of not inflaming religious passions, the chief constable asked Whitelaw for his advice; the latter discussed the matter with the Cardinal who was aware of rumours about Chesney.
The net effect was that the priest was never questioned by the police — in fact, he was able to provide them with an alibi for an IRA man whose car had been seen in Claudy on the morning of the bombing. Instead he was transferred to a diocese in the Irish Republic, close enough for him to cross frequently and at will in and out of the north. He died of cancer eight years later at the age of 46.
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So, here is the situation. A priest who may be a senior member of the Provisional IRA is not questioned by the police. Instead there are three-way discussions involving the RUC, the British Government and the Cardinal Primate, as a result of which the priest is transferred to a nearby diocese in the Irish Republic.
A cover-up? A conspiracy? The Police Ombudsman seemed to think so in a report released last week. The British government reacted by saying they were 'profoundly sorry' that Fr Chesney was not properly investigated.
Before you get too comfortable on your high horse, assured in your conviction about appropriate church-state separation, there is another side to this story.
Throughout more than 30 years of killing