A GROUP representing former residents of residential institutions run by the religious orders has warned against turning the Ryan commission report into a political football. It has also described much of the “tone” of current debate on the report as “unhelpful”.
Michael Waters, spokesman for Survivors of Child Abuse (Soca) UK, said yesterday the group was “very concerned that a political football was about to be made of it ”.
He added: “My understanding is that it is to be discussed in the Dáil for two days and we feel that the tone of the debate is most unhelpful to all parties concerned.”
He said “Cardinal Seán Brady and the Christian Brothers have made profound apologies and we should take them in good faith. We all need to cease for a moment and take constructive action in order to move it on and see where we can go from here.”
Soca UK was willing to meet with all interested parties “to discuss a way forward that will be beneficial to all. It must be possible for us as concerned people to sit down together to find a way.”
Meanwhile, Fr Michael Mernagh, the Augustinian priest who undertook a walk of atonement last January from Cobh to the Pro-Cathedral in Dublin over the handling of clerical sex abuse in Cloyne diocese, has said that the 2002 church-State redress agreement “didn’t do any justice to the Gospel principles”.
Asked yesterday on Newstalk radio’s Lunchtime with Eamon Keane programme whether he thought the congregations were morally obliged to revisit the redress agreement, he said: “Of course.”
“It goes without saying that the first priority now for all of us who call ourselves religious, or clergy or church, is to ensure that those who were damaged and those who are seeking some recognition and support that they’re given that support at whatever it costs us,” he said.
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