THE child abuse scandal unfolding in Jersey and now, it appears, in Guernsey as well, has a hideous familiarity about it. First of all there is the institution in which the Jersey abuses are alleged to have happened, namely Haut de la Garenne.
Physically it is exactly like the institutions in this country to which tens of thousands of Irish children were sent down the years.
It was, in fact, an industrial school just like our industrial schools and it was founded in 1867, around the time many Irish industrial schools were being founded. There is no coincidence here.
The industrial schools were an invention of British law and were considered at the time the best way to deal with abused or neglected or delinquent children. It was better than leaving them on the streets, or with abusive or neglectful parents, or putting them into adult prisons, the thinking went.
In the context of their time they were seen as progressive, as amazing as that seems to us now.
But of course the industrial schools in Britain, just as in Ireland, were dreadful places even when they were well-run. They were grotesquely under-staffed and under-resourced for most of their history and children who ideally needed the love, care and attention of their parents instead found themselves competing with 30 other children for the attention of one adult who commonly approached the challenge of dealing with so many children in a quasi-militaristic manner that placed most of the emphasis on discipline and uniformity.
We now know that many industrial schools, even allowing for their terrible, in-built limitations, were badly run and that sometimes terrible abuses -- physical, sexual and emotional -- took place within their walls.
It happened in Irish industrial schools.
It happened in British industrial schools and abuses of a particularly awful kind even by the standards of other homes, appear to have taken place at Haut de la Garenne.
Other aspects of this grim case are familiar as well. For example, authorities on the island claim not to have known anything untoward was happening at the school, or else they simply didn't believe the more "outlandish" stories.
The reports of official inspectors gave the school a clean bill of health. In addition, there are accusations of a cover-up.
So far, so very, very familiar. But there is one very big difference that must be noted. Haut de la Garenne was not run by the Catholic Church, or any other church for that matter. In common with most industrial schools in Britain it was lay-run.
Currently Justice Sean Ryan and his commission are investigating the way in which industrial schools in this country were run and a report should be published before too much longer. As we know, the vast majority of such schools in this country were run by 18 Catholic religious orders and for this reason a special blame attaches to the Catholic Church, as it must where abuses occurred.
But there is an added temptation, and that is to suggest that there is something intrinsic to Catholicism, intrinsic to its structures, intrinsic to the religious life, intrinsic to the way the Church is run that is responsible for what happened in the institutions.
If abuse took place in institutions run by the Catholic Church -- and it did -- then no-one can justly complain when the Catholic Church is blamed for the abuse.
When Catholicism itself is blamed, when the saga of the industrial schools is woven into a generalised attack on Catholicism as an idea, then we can justly complain.
When someone says celibacy was to blame for the scandals we can reasonably ask why abuses also took place on a wide scale in institutions not run by celibates?
When the vow of obedience is blamed, we can ask why abuses took place where there was no vow of obedience?
Likewise when the "patriarchal" nature of the Church is blamed, and likewise when the Church's general and supposedly "repressive" view of human sexuality is held responsible.
We will soon know whether the Ryan Commission has fallen for this particular narrative of blame or whether it will take a more realistic view.
The realistic view suggests that child abusers will try and infiltrate any institution -- whether church or lay-run -- that gives them easy access to children, and that all institutions have an instinct to protect themselves by denying any abuse took place, or by punishing the whistle-blower.
This has been the consistent pattern here in Ireland, in Jersey, in the rest of Britain, in the US, in Canada, in Russia, in China, in all parts of the world no matter who or what ran, or runs, these institutions.
Catholicism per se is not responsible for what happened in the industrial schools, although individual catholics are.
Nor is Christianity per se.
Nor is religion per se.
This is why the story of virtually all industrial schools and children's homes -- whether religious run or not -- is the same.
The tale of Haut de la Garenne in Jersey simply confirms this.
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