Too bad the Holy Spirit doesn't cover magisterial financial inerrancy:

Irish Roman Catholic priests in the country’s second-biggest diocese took pay cuts of about 10 percent after church investments in bank stocks dropped as much as 7 million euros ($10 million).

The Killaloe diocese, which covers parts of the midlands and west of Ireland, cut salaries by between 8 and 12 percent, after shares fell and bank dividends were eliminated, Willy Walsh, the Bishop of Killaloe, said in an interview with Ireland’s RTE radio today.

Ireland’s ISEF Index of financial stocks has fallen more than 90 percent from its February 2007 peak, as the banking system last year came close to collapse after real-estate prices tumbled and credit markets froze. The government has nationalized Anglo Irish Bank Corp., and pumped 7 billion euros into Bank of Ireland Plc and Allied Irish Banks Plc to help save the lenders as bad debts surged.

“All of us thought that bank shares were a safe as possible place to put money,” Walsh said. “Obviously in hindsight, they weren’t.”

Legacies Lost

Priests in Killaloe earn between 20,000 euros and 25,000 euros a year, the Irish Times reported today, citing Walsh. A spokeswoman for the Catholic church in Ireland said it doesn’t keep data on priests’ earnings and that payments are a matter for individual dioceses.

Around 120 priests work in the diocese, which covers most of County Clare and parts of Tipperary, Offaly, Laois, and Limerick. There are 58 parishes in the diocese, with a population of about 122,000, according to its Web site.

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