Priest won’t rule out challenge to €500 Covid fine for holding Mass
A PRIEST who has been fined €500 for allowing parishioners into Sunday Mass has not ruled out taking a constitutional challenge against the Government’s Covid-19 regulation that insists places of worship remain closed,
Cavan cleric Fr PJ Hughes, the parish priest of Mullahoran, spoke to the Irish Mail On Sunday this week to confirm
‘The fine is my problem, not theirs’
that following a court ruling in Scotland the previous day – in which the Scottish High Court deemed a ban on churches opening to be unlawful – he is considering a similar course of action here.
Fr Hughes said: ‘The priests in Scotland won their case, but theirs is a human rights case; mine is not a human rights one.
‘It’s a constitutional issue here. I can’t go down two roads – it is not a human rights matter but a constitutional one. I haven’t made my mind up. I’m kind of stuck in the middle about it,’ he said.
The Scottish decision arose after a group of 27 church leaders launched a judicial review at the Court of Session arguing that the Scottish government acted beyond its emergency powers.
Judge Braid, agreed the regulations went further than was lawfully allowed.
Sources here suggest that if a challenge is to be mounted it is most likely to cite Article 44 Section 5 of the Constitution, which states: ‘Every religious denomination shall have the right to manage its own affairs, own, acquire and administer property, movable and immovable, and maintain institutions for religious or charitable purposes.’
Fr Hughes, who has said he will go to jail rather than pay the fine, ruled out allowing parishioners pay on his behalf.
‘No there’s to be no whipround, no. I wouldn’t accept that at all – no no, absolutely not. I wouldn’t even consider it – this is my problem here, not theirs.’