http://www.irishsalem.com/individuals/Politicians%20and%20Others/archbishop-martin/martinandpaedophilering-29nov09.php
Martin: Is There a Paedophile Ring?
Disturbing connections between abusing priests prompts Archbishop's request to gardai for further investigation
Sunday Independent, November 29 2009 by Maeve Sheehan
THE ARCHBISHOP of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, asked the gardai to investigate whether a clerical paedophile ring was operating in the archdiocese.
Dr Diarmuid Martin made the request to the National Bureau of Criminal Investigations after he examined files on paedophile priests in recent years. He was disturbed by close connections between a number of clerics who were later convicted of child abuse, according to sources, and asked gardai to investigate.
The priests included Fr Bill Carney and Fr Francis McCarthy, neither of whom are any longer in the priesthood, and Fr Patrick Maguire, a Columban priest, who is living under the strict supervision of his order. The three are among 46 priests named in the damning report by Judge Yvonne Murphy which found "no direct evidence" of a paedophile ring but found "worrying connections" between a number of priests.
Fr Carney and Fr McCarthy worked together to prey on vulnerable children, visiting them in children's homes and, in at least one instance, abused the same child. Fr Carney and Fr Maguire brought children on swimming excursions together. Fr Carney also claimed that Fr Maguire could vouch for him when he was under investigation for abusing some of those children.
Fr Dominic Savio Boland, whose real name is John Boland, called to the home of a child who had been abused by another priest, Fr Ioannes, and proceeded to abuse the child himself.
"There is nothing in the evidence available to the commission to show how Fr Boland became aware of this young boy," the report said.
Another priest, Fr Horatio, was given the use of a holiday home by Fr Sean Fortune, a notorious child abuser in the Wexford diocese.
The report says that "Archbishop Martin has referred some of these matters to the gardai in recent times". Sources close to the archbishop said he was concerned at the connections between the priests and asked the gardai to investigate whether a paedophile ring was operating in the clergy. A Garda spokesman declined to comment on a paedophile ring, but sources said all links between these priests and others in the archdiocese would be investigated.
The findings of the commission on child sex abuse in the archdiocese have had profound ramifications with mounting calls for the immediate resignations of serving bishops who are criticised in the report and a high-level Garda review of the report's findings on collusion and cover-up.
Taoiseach Brian Cowen yesterday stopped short of repeating Fine Gael calls for the resignations of serving members of the hierarchy. In a statement yesterday, he said it was up to religious organisations to determine the "appropriateness" of individuals to hold ecclesiastical office. Catholic bishops are expected to issue a statement on the report today.
In another development Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheal Martin is considering calling the Papal Nuncio to account for ignoring requests for information from Judge Yvonne Murphy.
A source close to the minister said that he is considering the unprecedented diplomatic move on foot of the Murphy report's revelation that the Nuncio, the Pope's ambassador in Ireland, ignored a request to disclose files to the Commission. A second request to the Vatican for files passed to it by the Dublin office was also ignored. A Vatican spokesman, Fr Federico Lombardi, was quoted as saying that the commission did not go through the proper diplomatic channels.
Colm O'Gorman, the veteran campaigner against clerical sex abuse and director of Amnesty said: "I would expect the Minister for Foreign Affairs to summon the Papal Nuncio to Iveagh House to explain why his State failed to comply with the statutory inquiry and on what basis they felt it was appropriate to ignore the request. He is a diplomat; the minister should have him explain himself."
John O'Mahony, an assistant Garda commissioner appointed to review the Murphy report on Friday, is to meet officers from the Garda sexual assault unit this week. The failings of some gardai were amongst the most surprising findings of the Murphy report, with former Garda commissioner Daniel Costigan among those criticised for passing a complaint about a priest to Archbishop John Charles McQuaid.
The relationship between several senior gardai and priests and bishops was inappropriate. However, several gardai were praised, one of them Finbar Garland, now a sergeant, who successfully prosecuted Fr Bill Carney for indecent assault. The report found that Bishop James Kavanagh attempted to influence the investigation through his contact with a chief superintendent.
Sgt Garland, who now heads the stolen car unit, told the Sunday Independent that there was never a suggestion to him at the time that the investigation should be blocked. "I was less than a year in the job. When you see two young boys of eight or nine years of age, holding their dads' hands, and they are looking up at you and they are actually frightened and in fear, because they think they had done something wrong, that annoyed me more than anything else," he said. "I was disgusted that anyone could do that to a child."
Of the 46 priests in the report, 14 are dead and a number are believed to be unsupervised and living freely in the community either in Ireland or abroad. The Murphy report listed the whereabouts of three convicted paedophiles -- Fr John Kinsella, Fr Ivan Payne and Fr Bill Carney -- as being unknown. Nine of the 46 are laicised. They include Fr Francis McCarthy, who abused children in collusion with Fr Carney. Another priest, known as Fr Donato, is now married and has a child.
Another 126 priests suspected of child abuse were not investigated by the commission.
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/martin-is-there-a-paedophile-ring-1957915.html
Martin: Is There a Paedophile Ring?
Disturbing connections between abusing priests prompts Archbishop's request to gardai for further investigation
Sunday Independent, November 29 2009 by Maeve Sheehan
THE ARCHBISHOP of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, asked the gardai to investigate whether a clerical paedophile ring was operating in the archdiocese.
Dr Diarmuid Martin made the request to the National Bureau of Criminal Investigations after he examined files on paedophile priests in recent years. He was disturbed by close connections between a number of clerics who were later convicted of child abuse, according to sources, and asked gardai to investigate.
The priests included Fr Bill Carney and Fr Francis McCarthy, neither of whom are any longer in the priesthood, and Fr Patrick Maguire, a Columban priest, who is living under the strict supervision of his order. The three are among 46 priests named in the damning report by Judge Yvonne Murphy which found "no direct evidence" of a paedophile ring but found "worrying connections" between a number of priests.
Fr Carney and Fr McCarthy worked together to prey on vulnerable children, visiting them in children's homes and, in at least one instance, abused the same child. Fr Carney and Fr Maguire brought children on swimming excursions together. Fr Carney also claimed that Fr Maguire could vouch for him when he was under investigation for abusing some of those children.
Fr Dominic Savio Boland, whose real name is John Boland, called to the home of a child who had been abused by another priest, Fr Ioannes, and proceeded to abuse the child himself.
"There is nothing in the evidence available to the commission to show how Fr Boland became aware of this young boy," the report said.
Another priest, Fr Horatio, was given the use of a holiday home by Fr Sean Fortune, a notorious child abuser in the Wexford diocese.
The report says that "Archbishop Martin has referred some of these matters to the gardai in recent times". Sources close to the archbishop said he was concerned at the connections between the priests and asked the gardai to investigate whether a paedophile ring was operating in the clergy. A Garda spokesman declined to comment on a paedophile ring, but sources said all links between these priests and others in the archdiocese would be investigated.
The findings of the commission on child sex abuse in the archdiocese have had profound ramifications with mounting calls for the immediate resignations of serving bishops who are criticised in the report and a high-level Garda review of the report's findings on collusion and cover-up.
Taoiseach Brian Cowen yesterday stopped short of repeating Fine Gael calls for the resignations of serving members of the hierarchy. In a statement yesterday, he said it was up to religious organisations to determine the "appropriateness" of individuals to hold ecclesiastical office. Catholic bishops are expected to issue a statement on the report today.
In another development Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheal Martin is considering calling the Papal Nuncio to account for ignoring requests for information from Judge Yvonne Murphy.
A source close to the minister said that he is considering the unprecedented diplomatic move on foot of the Murphy report's revelation that the Nuncio, the Pope's ambassador in Ireland, ignored a request to disclose files to the Commission. A second request to the Vatican for files passed to it by the Dublin office was also ignored. A Vatican spokesman, Fr Federico Lombardi, was quoted as saying that the commission did not go through the proper diplomatic channels.
Colm O'Gorman, the veteran campaigner against clerical sex abuse and director of Amnesty said: "I would expect the Minister for Foreign Affairs to summon the Papal Nuncio to Iveagh House to explain why his State failed to comply with the statutory inquiry and on what basis they felt it was appropriate to ignore the request. He is a diplomat; the minister should have him explain himself."
John O'Mahony, an assistant Garda commissioner appointed to review the Murphy report on Friday, is to meet officers from the Garda sexual assault unit this week. The failings of some gardai were amongst the most surprising findings of the Murphy report, with former Garda commissioner Daniel Costigan among those criticised for passing a complaint about a priest to Archbishop John Charles McQuaid.
The relationship between several senior gardai and priests and bishops was inappropriate. However, several gardai were praised, one of them Finbar Garland, now a sergeant, who successfully prosecuted Fr Bill Carney for indecent assault. The report found that Bishop James Kavanagh attempted to influence the investigation through his contact with a chief superintendent.
Sgt Garland, who now heads the stolen car unit, told the Sunday Independent that there was never a suggestion to him at the time that the investigation should be blocked. "I was less than a year in the job. When you see two young boys of eight or nine years of age, holding their dads' hands, and they are looking up at you and they are actually frightened and in fear, because they think they had done something wrong, that annoyed me more than anything else," he said. "I was disgusted that anyone could do that to a child."
Of the 46 priests in the report, 14 are dead and a number are believed to be unsupervised and living freely in the community either in Ireland or abroad. The Murphy report listed the whereabouts of three convicted paedophiles -- Fr John Kinsella, Fr Ivan Payne and Fr Bill Carney -- as being unknown. Nine of the 46 are laicised. They include Fr Francis McCarthy, who abused children in collusion with Fr Carney. Another priest, known as Fr Donato, is now married and has a child.
Another 126 priests suspected of child abuse were not investigated by the commission.
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/martin-is-there-a-paedophile-ring-1957915.html
So, This Was Not a Paedophile Ring?
There was Masonic-style secrecy involved in covering up the shocking abuse in this country over the years, writes Liam Collins
Sunday Independent, November 29 2009 by Liam Collins
So where were the dirty deals done? It is impossible to believe that covering up for deviant priests was organised in casual conversation between the aristocrats of the Church, the senior policemen and the civil servants who colluded in hiding the scandal of clerical sex abuse from the public.
Of course, these people were meeting on State occasions, they mixed socially and on sporting occasions. But there was nothing casual about this cover-up. This was highly organised.
It is clear from the Murphy report that the cardinals, archbishops and the top echelons of the Catholic Church had access to the best legal, medical and financial advice when it came to dealing with a tsunami of deviants and paedophiles who were using the Church as a cloak for their horrible activities.
Their advisers took on the Church & General Insurance company from 1987 and ran rings around them. For a premium of about €50,000 a year they got about €50m to compensate the victims. You don't do that without corporate planning, and that corporate planning was done on a 'need to know' basis by churchmen and their friends in high places.
But it went deeper that that. There were 'connections' -- funny handshakes, meetings in dark corners. The tentacles of the Catholic Church reached far beyond the dark aisles of the archbishop's palace and into the corridors of power.
If this weren't Ireland we could say there was a Masonic-style ring operating at the highest echelons in the Church and the State. But there was serious planning involved in covering up the scandal, in moving deviant priests from one parish to the next, in sending them abroad, in organising secret compensation for their victims. And it is this cover-up that needs further investigation.
Many ordinary priests were themselves unaware of what was going at the highest level in the Church they worked for.
"We were told 'we have heard what you are saying and we will deal with it'," says Fr Brian D'Arcy, "that was shorthand for saying we will do nothing and it will all blow over."
But Fr D'Arcy was going to get the truth. The whole culture and structure of the Church was to protect its reputation, its majesty and its pomp.
The cynical leaders of the Catholic Church took a decision that how they were seen in the eyes of the faithful was more important than the innocence of children.
Priests were told not to ask the names of abusers when mothers came to complain; the priest offenders 'disappeared' on the orders of Church leaders, to new parishes where the abuse would start all over again. And they also used Jesuitical phrases and political answers to protect themselves, fooling themselves into thinking that they were telling the truth when they knew that it wasn't the 'real' truth.
"What I think is that the powers that be convinced themselves that the children would get over it and that by hiding this they were protecting the Church and the faithful from scandal -- they were protecting the image of the priesthood," says Fr D'Arcy
"Some priests even believed that by going to confession they could change everything -- it might have changed things for the priest, but it does not change the damage done to the children or the abuse."
We now have all the evidence we need of a cover-up among senior churchmen and among senior figures in the State. The Church is not the only institution that should bear the brunt of public anger and revulsion: those who allowed it to continue are equally to blame.
http://www.independent.ie/opinion/analysis/so-this-was-not-a-paedophile-ring-1957850.html
There was Masonic-style secrecy involved in covering up the shocking abuse in this country over the years, writes Liam Collins
Sunday Independent, November 29 2009 by Liam Collins
So where were the dirty deals done? It is impossible to believe that covering up for deviant priests was organised in casual conversation between the aristocrats of the Church, the senior policemen and the civil servants who colluded in hiding the scandal of clerical sex abuse from the public.
Of course, these people were meeting on State occasions, they mixed socially and on sporting occasions. But there was nothing casual about this cover-up. This was highly organised.
It is clear from the Murphy report that the cardinals, archbishops and the top echelons of the Catholic Church had access to the best legal, medical and financial advice when it came to dealing with a tsunami of deviants and paedophiles who were using the Church as a cloak for their horrible activities.
Their advisers took on the Church & General Insurance company from 1987 and ran rings around them. For a premium of about €50,000 a year they got about €50m to compensate the victims. You don't do that without corporate planning, and that corporate planning was done on a 'need to know' basis by churchmen and their friends in high places.
But it went deeper that that. There were 'connections' -- funny handshakes, meetings in dark corners. The tentacles of the Catholic Church reached far beyond the dark aisles of the archbishop's palace and into the corridors of power.
If this weren't Ireland we could say there was a Masonic-style ring operating at the highest echelons in the Church and the State. But there was serious planning involved in covering up the scandal, in moving deviant priests from one parish to the next, in sending them abroad, in organising secret compensation for their victims. And it is this cover-up that needs further investigation.
Many ordinary priests were themselves unaware of what was going at the highest level in the Church they worked for.
"We were told 'we have heard what you are saying and we will deal with it'," says Fr Brian D'Arcy, "that was shorthand for saying we will do nothing and it will all blow over."
But Fr D'Arcy was going to get the truth. The whole culture and structure of the Church was to protect its reputation, its majesty and its pomp.
The cynical leaders of the Catholic Church took a decision that how they were seen in the eyes of the faithful was more important than the innocence of children.
Priests were told not to ask the names of abusers when mothers came to complain; the priest offenders 'disappeared' on the orders of Church leaders, to new parishes where the abuse would start all over again. And they also used Jesuitical phrases and political answers to protect themselves, fooling themselves into thinking that they were telling the truth when they knew that it wasn't the 'real' truth.
"What I think is that the powers that be convinced themselves that the children would get over it and that by hiding this they were protecting the Church and the faithful from scandal -- they were protecting the image of the priesthood," says Fr D'Arcy
"Some priests even believed that by going to confession they could change everything -- it might have changed things for the priest, but it does not change the damage done to the children or the abuse."
We now have all the evidence we need of a cover-up among senior churchmen and among senior figures in the State. The Church is not the only institution that should bear the brunt of public anger and revulsion: those who allowed it to continue are equally to blame.
http://www.independent.ie/opinion/analysis/so-this-was-not-a-paedophile-ring-1957850.html
https://www.culteducation.com/group/874-clergy-abuse/4696-100-dublin-priests-accused-of-abuse-since-1940.html
100 Dublin priests accused of abuse since 1940
· 350 children in one archdiocese affected
· Church may sell property to pay compensation
The Guardian, UK/March 9, 2006
By Owen Bowcott
The full extent of child abuse scandals threatening the Roman Catholic church in Ireland has emerged in a study by the archdiocese of Dublin which reveals that more than 100 of its priests have faced paedophile accusations since 1940.
The report, which constitutes the most serious admission by a senior cleric in the republic, has been published before a judicial committee of investigation is expected to begin taking evidence this month on the handling of complaints by the church. More than 350 children are said to have been sexually or physically abused in that period.
Commenting on the figures, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin said it might be necessary to sell property to meet compensation bills and that sacrifices would have to be made to set right past injustices. "It's very frightening for me to see that in some of these cases, so many children were abused. It's very hard to weigh that up against anything," said Archbishop Martin, a former Vatican diplomat who was appointed in 2003.
"On the other hand, I know that the vast majority of priests don't abuse, that they do good work, that they're extremely upset and offended by what's happened."
The Catholic archdiocese of Boston was nearly bankrupted by a paedophile scandal three years ago. Its archbishop, Cardinal Bernard Law, was forced to resign and the ensuing compensation settlement cost the American archdiocese £67m. The archbishop's palace was sold and dozens of parishes forced to close.
Archbishop Martin's report shows that 105 civil actions have been brought against 32 priests in Dublin. Nearly two-thirds have been resolved and 40 are being pursued. The cost of settlements so far is €5.8m (£4m). The diocese has invested a further €2.5m in its child protection services.
The latest figures are the result of a two-year trawl through church archives. Last October, at the conclusion of an earlier government inquiry into abuse cases in the Catholic diocese of Ferns, the archbishop's office in Dublin said it was aware of accusations against 67 priests.
The sharp increase revealed in this week's report - which says the true figure is at least 102 priests - is in part due to the inclusion of complaints against members of religious orders working for the diocese in Dublin. The personnel files of 2,800 priests spanning the period 1940to 2006 have been examined. Allegations were said to have been made against 91 priests and suspicions raised about another 11 clerical officials.
"These figures include new allegations and information which have been brought to the attention of the diocese as a result of the independent review, the publication of the Ferns report and ongoing work by the Child Protection Service," the report said. "They do not include allegations and suspicions made regarding priests who carried out ministry within the ambit of their own religious order." Eight local priests have been convicted of abuse. No cases are pending.
The new committee of investigation into affairs in the Dublin archdiocese will be chaired by a senior judge, Yvonne Murphy. She will examine a number of representative abuse cases dating back as far as 1975.
"Many of these new cases are historical," a spokesperson for the archdiocese told the Guardian yesterday. "Anything new that has emerged will have been referred to the [police] authorities."
Ireland, a traditionally Catholic country, whose state broadcaster still plays the toll of the Angelus bell before its evening bulletins, has been rocked by church sex scandals over the past decade. They have involved mistreatment of abandoned orphans, child sex abuse and supposedly celibate priests fathering offspring.
The Catholic church's gradual coming to terms with sexual abuse has proved highly sensitive for the Vatican. The present Pope, Benedict XVI, was previously in charge of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican office responsible for investigating abuse claims.
The Ferns inquiry, published by the Irish government last year, identified more than 100 allegations of child sexual abuse against 21 priests in that diocese dating back to 1962.
100 Dublin priests accused of abuse since 1940
· 350 children in one archdiocese affected
· Church may sell property to pay compensation
The Guardian, UK/March 9, 2006
By Owen Bowcott
The full extent of child abuse scandals threatening the Roman Catholic church in Ireland has emerged in a study by the archdiocese of Dublin which reveals that more than 100 of its priests have faced paedophile accusations since 1940.
The report, which constitutes the most serious admission by a senior cleric in the republic, has been published before a judicial committee of investigation is expected to begin taking evidence this month on the handling of complaints by the church. More than 350 children are said to have been sexually or physically abused in that period.
Commenting on the figures, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin said it might be necessary to sell property to meet compensation bills and that sacrifices would have to be made to set right past injustices. "It's very frightening for me to see that in some of these cases, so many children were abused. It's very hard to weigh that up against anything," said Archbishop Martin, a former Vatican diplomat who was appointed in 2003.
"On the other hand, I know that the vast majority of priests don't abuse, that they do good work, that they're extremely upset and offended by what's happened."
The Catholic archdiocese of Boston was nearly bankrupted by a paedophile scandal three years ago. Its archbishop, Cardinal Bernard Law, was forced to resign and the ensuing compensation settlement cost the American archdiocese £67m. The archbishop's palace was sold and dozens of parishes forced to close.
Archbishop Martin's report shows that 105 civil actions have been brought against 32 priests in Dublin. Nearly two-thirds have been resolved and 40 are being pursued. The cost of settlements so far is €5.8m (£4m). The diocese has invested a further €2.5m in its child protection services.
The latest figures are the result of a two-year trawl through church archives. Last October, at the conclusion of an earlier government inquiry into abuse cases in the Catholic diocese of Ferns, the archbishop's office in Dublin said it was aware of accusations against 67 priests.
The sharp increase revealed in this week's report - which says the true figure is at least 102 priests - is in part due to the inclusion of complaints against members of religious orders working for the diocese in Dublin. The personnel files of 2,800 priests spanning the period 1940to 2006 have been examined. Allegations were said to have been made against 91 priests and suspicions raised about another 11 clerical officials.
"These figures include new allegations and information which have been brought to the attention of the diocese as a result of the independent review, the publication of the Ferns report and ongoing work by the Child Protection Service," the report said. "They do not include allegations and suspicions made regarding priests who carried out ministry within the ambit of their own religious order." Eight local priests have been convicted of abuse. No cases are pending.
The new committee of investigation into affairs in the Dublin archdiocese will be chaired by a senior judge, Yvonne Murphy. She will examine a number of representative abuse cases dating back as far as 1975.
"Many of these new cases are historical," a spokesperson for the archdiocese told the Guardian yesterday. "Anything new that has emerged will have been referred to the [police] authorities."
Ireland, a traditionally Catholic country, whose state broadcaster still plays the toll of the Angelus bell before its evening bulletins, has been rocked by church sex scandals over the past decade. They have involved mistreatment of abandoned orphans, child sex abuse and supposedly celibate priests fathering offspring.
The Catholic church's gradual coming to terms with sexual abuse has proved highly sensitive for the Vatican. The present Pope, Benedict XVI, was previously in charge of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican office responsible for investigating abuse claims.
The Ferns inquiry, published by the Irish government last year, identified more than 100 allegations of child sexual abuse against 21 priests in that diocese dating back to 1962.
http://clericalwhispers.blogspot.com/2009/11/irelands-roman-catholic-archbishops.html
Friday, November 27, 2009
Ireland's Roman Catholic archbishops 'covered up abuse to protect church's reputation'
Ireland's Roman Catholic archbishops and police covered up four decades of child sex abuse by priests in a conspiracy to protect the reputation of the church, a report found.
Clergy were able to molest hundreds of vulnerable children because of a "systemic, calculated perversion of power" that put their abusers above the law, the Irish government said.
The damning verdict on the conduct of church and secular authorities followed a three-year investigation into allegations of child abuse by priests in Dublin going back to the 1960s.
Investigators who were given access to 60,000 previous secret church files accused four Archbishops of Dublin of deliberately suppressing evidence of "widespread" abuse.
Archbishops John Charles McQuaid, Dermot Ryan and Kevin McNamara, who have all since died, and Cardinal Desmond Connell, who is retired, all refused to pass information to local police, the report said.
Evidence was kept inside a secret vault in the archbishop's Dublin residence, with suspect clerics moved between parishes to prevent the allegations being made public.
For their part, Gardai frequently ignored complaints from victims, effectively granting priests immunity from prosecution. The inquiry found that church authorities nurtured inappropriately close relations with senior police officers.
Last night the current Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, apologised to the victims, describing their abuse as an "offence to God". He said: "I offer to each and every survivor my apology, my sorrow and my shame for what happened."
In a 750-page report published yesterday the Commission to Inquire into the Dublin Archdiocese blamed the church's "don't ask, don't tell" approach for perpetuating abuse.
"The Commission has no doubt that clerical child sexual abuse was covered up by the Archdiocese of Dublin and other Church authorities," it said.
"The structures and rules of the Catholic Church facilitated that cover-up.
"The State authorities facilitated that cover-up by not fulfilling their responsibilities to ensure that the law was applied equally to all and allowing the Church institutions to be beyond the reach of the normal law enforcement processes."
The inquiry, headed by Judge Yvonne Murphy, dismissed the claims of former bishops that they did not know sex abuse was a crime.
It concluded that the the church hierarchy was preoccupied with "the avoidance of scandal, the protection of the reputation of the Church, and the preservation of its assets".
It added: "All other considerations, including the welfare of children and justice for victims, were subordinated to these priorities."
The commission looked at a sample study of allegations made by 320 children against 46 priests between 1975 and 2004. One priest admitted to sexually abusing over 100 children, while another accepted that he had abused on a fortnightly basis over 25 years.
Two of the priests featured in the report have their names blacked out so not to undermine ongoing criminal actions.
Dermot Ahern, the Irish justice minister, said that the Gardai would review its procedures for dealing with sexual abuse complaints, and promised to continue to pursue the perpetrators.
"The report catalogues evil after evil committed in the name of what was perversely seen as the greater good," he said.
"There is no escaping the cruel irony that the church, partly motivated by a desire to avoid scandal, in fact created a scandal on an astonishing scale."
Victims called for senior Catholics and police officers to face criminal charges over the cover-up, and for the inquiry to be expanded to cover every Irish archdiocese.
"Those who turn a blind eye to these offences are as much a part of the problem as those who actually commit them," said Andrew Madden, who helped blow the whistle on the abuse 10 years ago.
The publication of the report, which was submitted to the Irish government in July, is expected to prompt a wave of new child abuse allegations against Catholic priests.
On Wednesday the Christian Brothers religious order announced it had set aside £145 million to compensate children who had been abused in its schools in orphanages in Ireland.
That offer came six months after a landmark report revealed widespread sexual, physical and emotional abuse of children in Catholic-run institutions dating back to the 1930s.
Friday, November 27, 2009
Ireland's Roman Catholic archbishops 'covered up abuse to protect church's reputation'
Ireland's Roman Catholic archbishops and police covered up four decades of child sex abuse by priests in a conspiracy to protect the reputation of the church, a report found.
Clergy were able to molest hundreds of vulnerable children because of a "systemic, calculated perversion of power" that put their abusers above the law, the Irish government said.
The damning verdict on the conduct of church and secular authorities followed a three-year investigation into allegations of child abuse by priests in Dublin going back to the 1960s.
Investigators who were given access to 60,000 previous secret church files accused four Archbishops of Dublin of deliberately suppressing evidence of "widespread" abuse.
Archbishops John Charles McQuaid, Dermot Ryan and Kevin McNamara, who have all since died, and Cardinal Desmond Connell, who is retired, all refused to pass information to local police, the report said.
Evidence was kept inside a secret vault in the archbishop's Dublin residence, with suspect clerics moved between parishes to prevent the allegations being made public.
For their part, Gardai frequently ignored complaints from victims, effectively granting priests immunity from prosecution. The inquiry found that church authorities nurtured inappropriately close relations with senior police officers.
Last night the current Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, apologised to the victims, describing their abuse as an "offence to God". He said: "I offer to each and every survivor my apology, my sorrow and my shame for what happened."
In a 750-page report published yesterday the Commission to Inquire into the Dublin Archdiocese blamed the church's "don't ask, don't tell" approach for perpetuating abuse.
"The Commission has no doubt that clerical child sexual abuse was covered up by the Archdiocese of Dublin and other Church authorities," it said.
"The structures and rules of the Catholic Church facilitated that cover-up.
"The State authorities facilitated that cover-up by not fulfilling their responsibilities to ensure that the law was applied equally to all and allowing the Church institutions to be beyond the reach of the normal law enforcement processes."
The inquiry, headed by Judge Yvonne Murphy, dismissed the claims of former bishops that they did not know sex abuse was a crime.
It concluded that the the church hierarchy was preoccupied with "the avoidance of scandal, the protection of the reputation of the Church, and the preservation of its assets".
It added: "All other considerations, including the welfare of children and justice for victims, were subordinated to these priorities."
The commission looked at a sample study of allegations made by 320 children against 46 priests between 1975 and 2004. One priest admitted to sexually abusing over 100 children, while another accepted that he had abused on a fortnightly basis over 25 years.
Two of the priests featured in the report have their names blacked out so not to undermine ongoing criminal actions.
Dermot Ahern, the Irish justice minister, said that the Gardai would review its procedures for dealing with sexual abuse complaints, and promised to continue to pursue the perpetrators.
"The report catalogues evil after evil committed in the name of what was perversely seen as the greater good," he said.
"There is no escaping the cruel irony that the church, partly motivated by a desire to avoid scandal, in fact created a scandal on an astonishing scale."
Victims called for senior Catholics and police officers to face criminal charges over the cover-up, and for the inquiry to be expanded to cover every Irish archdiocese.
"Those who turn a blind eye to these offences are as much a part of the problem as those who actually commit them," said Andrew Madden, who helped blow the whistle on the abuse 10 years ago.
The publication of the report, which was submitted to the Irish government in July, is expected to prompt a wave of new child abuse allegations against Catholic priests.
On Wednesday the Christian Brothers religious order announced it had set aside £145 million to compensate children who had been abused in its schools in orphanages in Ireland.
That offer came six months after a landmark report revealed widespread sexual, physical and emotional abuse of children in Catholic-run institutions dating back to the 1930s.
