IN ADVANCE of last week's publication of the Cloyne Report it
was expected that there would be a re-run of the now all too familiar
revelations of church failures to deal properly with its extensive back
catalogue of sordid abuse by the clergy.
What was not expected was that
the report would reveal a level of systemic failures, cover-ups and
collusion that amounts to such an abuse of trust that it could force a
fundamental change in church/ state relations in Ireland.
The
report by Ms Justice Yvonne Murphy goes beyond highlighting failures
within the diocese of Cloyne and stands as an indictment of how the
Catholic hierarchy dealt with clerical sex abuse in Ireland and how they
had the arrogance to regard the law of the land as somehow subservient
to the law of the church.
The inquiry itself didn't set out to establish
whether or not the many allegations of child sex abuse by priests in
Cloyne were true or not, instead it examined the manner in which church
and state authorities dealt with these complaints.
The Commission of Investigation found that the former bishop of
Cloyne John Magee not only failed to implement church procedures for
dealing with abuse cases but also lied to both the previous government
and to the HSE about the diocese's handling of abuse complaints.
Dr
Magee, who is a former private secretary to three popes, is described in
the report as an 'ineffective bishop' who took ' little or no active
interest' in child sex abuse cases.
Instead he delegated the job to Mgr
Denis O'Callaghan of Mallow who was found in the report to have been
'uncommitted' to the task and guilty of 'inexplicable failures' to
recognise child sex abuse.
Worse still, Mgr O'Callaghan 'stymied' the
implementation of the church's own reporting procedures and didn't even
accept that the church had a responsibility to report alleged offenders
to the civil authorities.
If that was the whole story of the sad and sorry affair it would be
truly, truly awful.
The shocking reality though is that the story
doesn't stop with the diocese of Cloyne and its shameful failure of
alleged abuse victims.
No, this is a disgrace that is shared by the
entire Catholic church and runs right to the gilded halls of the
Vatican.
In 1996 the Irish Bishops' Conference introduced its 'framework
document', which outlined procedures for reporting sex abuse claims to
garden and the HSE.
However, the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy
subsequently told Irish bishops the framework document was not official,
was merely a discussion document and that it 'appeared contrary to
canonical discipline' in places.
The effect of this - coming straight
from the Vatican - was to give a safe place to shelter to those who
preferred to do nothing rather than face up to the awful reality of
clerical sex abuse.
The behaviour of those at the top is hugely
important, bearing in mind that the Catholic Church is the absolute
model of a hierarchical power structure.
It is not difficult to
understand how Bishop Magee and Mgr O'Callaghan could feel they were
doing the right thing by protecting the church.
Following the revelations in the Cloyne Report, Justice Minister Alan
Shatter has promised to bring in new legislation to make reporting of
child abuse mandatory, with jail terms of up to five years for priests
who fail to report paedophiles to the gardai.
Given the church's
appalling record on protecting children from clerical sex abusers and
its history of cover-ups, there is no reason to believe there aren't
more skeletons in the cupboard in every diocese in Ireland.
We know we
can't trust the church to deal honestly with this so the law of the land
must.
In Taoiseach Enda Kenny's words ' the law of the land should not
be stopped by a crozier or a collar'.
The sooner that thinking is put
into effect the better and if the church is uncomfortable with it then
it is no more than what it has earned.