The Association of Catholic Priests, a group of reform priests, wants to call a historic first national assembly for the Irish Catholic Church with a view to addressing the clerical child abuse crisis.

A statement from the group read “The time may well be right for some form of assembly or synod of the Irish church."

They also revealed that they wish to have a meeting with the hierarchy of the Church to begin organizing the assembly taking in all sections of the Church and lay people. They agreed to examine the structures including a dialogue on the relation of the Church to sexuality, clerical celibacy and the exclusion of women.
The group of reform minded priests has held several meetings recently and want far greater transparency in the Irish church following the recent scandals.
Their efforts to date have been ignored by church leaders and it is uncertain how much support they have across the priesthood.