The Irish Times
April 27, 1999, CITY EDITION

Singer says she will live in Lourdes

By JOE HUMPHREYS

The singer Sinead O'Connor, who was ordained a Tridentine priest 
last week, has said she intends never to return to live in Ireland.

"I will live the rest of my days in Lourdes. I have bought a house here and
will use it as a base for travelling around the world," she told The Irish
Times. "I will never live in Ireland or England again."

Ms O'Connor, who has been renamed Mother Bernadette Mary, again rejected
criticism yesterday of her ordination from Bishop Pat Buckley, a fellow
Tridentine.

The bishop said he was concerned the singer may have committed simony - the
act of paying for a sacrament - by donating (pounds) 150,000 to, and
agreeing to fund a hernia operation for, Bishop Michael Cox, who ordained
the singer last Thursday. Bishop Buckley also said Ms O'Connor "did no
preparation to ready herself for priesthood".

However, Ms O'Connor said Bishop Buckley was jealous and reacting to her
refusal to allow him carry out the ordination. She said the (pounds)
150,000 was to fund a healing centre for the Travelling community at Bishop
Cox's church in Co Offaly.

"I have made ridiculous amounts of money in my career and I offered it to
him without any conditions. That man would not have ordained me for
(pounds) 3 million."

On RTE's Marian Finucane radio show, Ms O'Connor described her ordination
as a form of "death and rebirth". "I wanted to kill off this pop star thing
that wasn't fulfilling my sense of purpose and mission and wanting to help
people. I'm still going to work and fund my ministry, obviously, as a
singer, and I'm still an artist first and foremost . . . but I feel a sense
of purpose I never felt before."

She expressed regret for famously tearing up a picture of Pope John Paul II
on stage. "I was expressing a lot of hurt that I had been given in my life
in a misplaced manner and I do apologise for that . . . I know this sounds
completely insane but it wasn't meant to be disrespectful towards Catholic
people or the Pope. I've never even met the man. I'm sure he's a lovely
man. It was more an expression of frustration at the church which I'm sure
quite a lot of Irish people felt at that time."

Rejecting her critics, she said "anyone who has any intelligence . . .
would recognise the genius of what is taking place here. The church has
been trying for years to wrack their brains to figure out how they are
going to bring young people back into the church.

"Now, frankly, I think a lot more people will be interested in coming to a
Mass that I said than they have been so far. Even if people come out of
curiosity, at least it gets them into the church and hopefully they hear
one syllable that inspires them or one word that inspires them."

She added: "I think I am a very good and loving person that I have been
prepared to take the crucifixions which I will now have to put up with for
doing this so as to bring people back to the Catholic Church, because the
church was dying.

"What I've done is resurrect the church and saved its life and I hope the
church will be strong enough to see that."