Archbishop Sean Brady has said he is to discuss the abuse of children in residential institutions run by religious orders with the Pope.The leader of the Catholic Church in Ireland also said that the compensation deal agreed by the Irish government with the orders should be revisited.
More than 2,000 people told the Commission to Inquire Into Child Abuse they suffered physical and sexual abuse as children in the institutions.
It found that sexual abuse was "endemic" in boys' institutions, and church leaders knew what was going on.
The Irish deputy prime minister, Mary Coughlan, described the abuse of children in Catholic-run institutions as one of the "darkest chapters" in Irish history.
The report, nine years in the making and covering a period of six decades, also found government inspectors failed to stop beatings, rapes and humiliation.
The findings will not be used for criminal prosecutions - in part because the Christian Brothers successfully sued the commission in 2004 to keep the identities of all of its members, dead or alive, unnamed in the report.
'Cheated'
No real names, whether of victims or perpetrators, appear in the final document.
John Walsh, of Irish Survivors of Child Abuse, said he felt "cheated and deceived" by the lack of prosecutions.
"I would have never opened my wounds if I'd known this was going to be the end result," he said.
"It has devastated me and will devastate most victims because there are no criminal proceedings and no accountability whatsoever."
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Source (BBC)
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