Due to cost-cutting, Ireland is closing their embassy in the Vatican. This diplomatic relation doesn’t give Ireland an economic return, though it probably does give an economic return to the Vatican.
This closure is especially interesting given the recent statements the Irish prime minister has made, in which he denounces the way the Vatican has been covering up the child molestation by Irish Roman Catholic priests, as well as other long standing grievances imposed on Ireland by clerical classes, such as the Magdalene laundries.
In light of all these abuses against the Irish people, it is incredible that the Vatican has the balls to say that they view their diplomatic role with Ireland as ‘promoting human values’. As Ophelia Benson wrote in a post about the closure of the embassy:
Promoting human values. Human values. What the fuck does the Vatican have to do with promoting human values – the whole point of the Catholic church is that the values are goddy values, not human values. What human values?
During these tough economic times, perhaps the Philippine government should follow the lead of the Irish government and close our diplomatic missions with the Vatican. After all, what benefits do we get from having these costly relations? Maybe the Philippine government could even use the savings to fund the reproductive health bill…
Image by enggul, licensed under Creative Commons
Diplomatic relations go beyond financial reasons. Obviously Ireland's decision had little to do with economics as it did with politics or vindictiveness. At any rate, it's their loss really. It's never going to happen for the Philippines unless one of you guys becomes the president. LOL
//Obviously Ireland's decision had little to do with economics as it did with politics or vindictiveness. //
If I found out that a state like the Vatican was systematically harboring child-rapists in my country for years, and hiding them from my police, giving their embassy the boot would be the nicest thing I can think of doing.
I honestly believe we will get a long sermon about how greedy we can get, if we shut them down.