For his first papal encyclical, due this week, Benedict XVI has chosen to explain the difference between love and lust. In the letter to his bishops the pope will declare that eros, or erotic love, is different from agape, a Greek word that means unconditional, spiritual and selfless love.

Should he need a case history from within his clergy, the Pope could point to Fr Maurice Dillane, a 73-year-old curate from Galway, who has fathered a child with his 31-year-old girlfriend. No greater love hath a priest than that he lay down his clerical collar for his son.

Of course Pope Benedict will not refer to “Mossy”, as the Galway priest is affectionately known, in the encyclical. The Vatican appears to be in denial over repeated challenges to priestly celibacy in Ireland, the erstwhile land of saints and scholars.

Last year Willie Walsh, a leading bishop, said the priesthood should be open to both married and celibate men, and he urged a full debate on this “very serious question”. There has been no response from Rome, which has in the past summoned apostates for a dressing down.

Yesterday the bishop of Galway announced the return of the Catholic church’s prodigal Irish son: Eamon Casey. He is to live in the village of Beagh, near Gort, in Galway. “The attitude of the priests and people of the diocese towards (Casey’s) return has been both positive and compassionate,” said Dr Martin Drennan.

Voluble and charismatic, Casey is not likely to live out a quiet retirement on the fringes of the church. The regular visits to Galway of his son, Peter, are likely to become tabloid fodder and will keep the former bishop and his past in the headlines.

But is the very fact of his return to the diocese from which he fled in scandal and disgrace in 1992 a signal that the church in Ireland is now developing a more mature attitude to those within its numbers who fall by the wayside?

“IT’s great to hear of a heterosexual priest for a change,” commented Fr Michael Commane when the news broke. It was certainly a relief from the torrent of clerical child sex abuse to hear the uplifting story of Fr Mossie, a six handicap golfer, fathering a child with a woman more than 40 years his junior.

According to tabloid newspaper reports, Christopher Joseph Byrnes was born last November 23 to primary school teacher Madonna Byrnes. The “name of father” slot on the child’s birth certificate is said to be blank, but Dillane is believed to be the missing person.

A late convert to the priesthood after a career in banking, Dillane worked as a missionary priest in San Antonio, Texas for several years before returning to Ireland in 1994. He and Byrnes are believed to have started a relationship two years later, and when he was moved to a different parish in 2004, she moved also.

Following the birth of his son, Dillane confessed to his bishop and retired on January 6. He went into hiding last week, followed by a media posse, although a smaller one than would have been deployed in the past.

“I am really disappointed that this was front page news,” said Brian Darcy, Ireland’s best known priest and now a stern critic of compulsory celibacy. “He was a priest for 40 years and he is entitled to do whatever he likes with his life. At his age, he would be well retired in any other walk of life. He, the baby and the baby’s mother will all have a tough enough time as it is.”

Indeed, church sources say the couple were deeply dismayed by the attention their story attracted, and are receiving counselling. In deference to their feelings, senior church figures decided not to comment on the case last week.

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