Archbishop asks colleagues to take responsibility for abuse failures
By Michael Kelly
Catholic News Service
DUBLIN, Ireland – Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin called on his episcopal colleagues to take responsibility for the Irish Catholic Church’s failures in dealing with child sexual abuse by priests.
“Without accountability for the past there will no healing and no trust for the future,” Archbishop Martin told reporters on 20 March following Mass at St Mary’s Pro-Cathedral in Dublin after Pope Benedict XVI’s pastoral letter to Irish Catholics on the abuse crisis was released.
Archbishop Martin described the letter as “part of a strategy of a renewal of the Church.” Many people “felt it was much stronger than expected,” he said.
Asked why the Pope did not make any reference to a Vatican role in the crisis in Ireland, Archbishop Martin said the responsibility “very much” fell on the Irish Church.
“The Vatican had produced the norms of Canon law and they weren’t respected in the management of these cases,” he said.
The Pope’s letter was read in full during Masses on 20 and 21 March in parishes across Ireland. Copies of the letter made available in some parishes were snapped up quickly by parishioners eager to see exactly what Pope Benedict had to say.
Reaction from abuse victims and their representative groups to the papal letter was mixed, with some expressing disappointment and others welcoming the initiative.
John Kelly of the Irish Survivors of Child Abuse Organisation, which represents many of those abused in Church-run industrial schools for abandoned and orphaned children, said the letter represented a long-overdue apology from the Pope.
“Victims desperately need closure for what happened to them. We are fed up being victims and don’t want to remain victims,” Kelly said.
“This letter is a possible step to closure and we owe it to ourselves to study it and to give it a measured response.
“We are heartened by the pontiff’s open acceptance that the abusive behaviour of priests and Religious were criminal acts.”
However, the One in Four group, which represents some of the people abused by Irish priests, responded to the letter with a “mixture of dismay and disappointment.”
Maeve Lewis, the group’s executive director, told Catholic News Service that she was deeply disappointed by the letter “for passing up a glorious opportunity to address the core issue in the clerical sexual abuse scandal: the deliberate policy of the Catholic Church at the highest levels to protect sex offenders.”
“While we welcome the Pope’s direction that the Church leadership cooperate with the civil authorities in relation to sexual abuse … we feel the letter falls far short of addressing the concerns of the victims,” she said.
At St Mary’s Cathedral in Killarney, Ireland on 21 March, a man attempted to attack Bishop William Murphy of Kerry as he read the Pope’s letter during Mass, reported the IrishCentral Web site.
The unnamed man, identified only as a former resident of an orphanage where children were abused, shouted “Apologise!” at Bishop Murphy as he ran toward the cleric.
He was restrained by six members of the congregation and wrestled out of church.
Police questioned the man but did not arrest him.
Cardinal Sean Brady of Armagh, Northern Ireland, said after the letter was released “it is evident from the pastoral letter that Pope Benedict is deeply dismayed by what he refers to as ‘sinful and criminal acts and the way the Church authorities in Ireland dealt with them.’”
“To us Bishops, he says we must admit ‘that grave errors of judgement were made and failures of leadership occurred’ which have seriously undermined our credibility and effectiveness,” the Cardinal said.
Cardinal Brady has been under pressure to resign since he admitted on 14 March that he had been aware of allegations of abuse against a priest as early as 1975 and did not report them to police.
Although Cardinal Brady has apologised for the error, he has resisted calls for his resignation, saying instead that he wanted to stay on as a “wounded healer.”
Archbishop Vincent Nichols of Westminster, president of the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, also welcomed the letter.
“From our experience in England and Wales, we have learned that the most important thing is to recognise and take to heart the profound damage done to children who have been abused. Putting the safeguarding of children and all vulnerable people at the centre of the Church’s efforts is essential,” he said.