I have never watched Downton Abbey and have thankfully never had to manage a large servants' hall, but I am pretty certain that secret meetings of the upper servants in the Housekeeper's Room (or should that be Butler's Pantry; housekeepers tend to be female) designed to circumvent the known wishes of the family would be a sacking offence.
Yet thi s is what the English bishops did last month when they rejected a request from the Council of Priests, of Hexham and Newcastle diocese, to support the ordination of married men. The bishops' plenary sessions are held as private meetings and they only tell us what they choose us to know, and we would not even have heard that they had discussed the issue if Bishop Seamus Cunningham had not properly reported back to his clergy.
This would be pretty bizarre behaviour anywhere except in the Church (for us it is normal). Apart from anything else, what on earth does it say about the bishops' teaching office? We know that a substantial number of the laity believe that the celibacy of the clergy is less important than regular and widespread access to the sacraments; we could be wrong but it would be quite good to know why.
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Source: We have a serious problem in the Church with a secrecy default button
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