Among the concelebrants with him and Archbishop Diarmuid Martin were Bishop Dermot O’Mahony and Bishop Éamonn Walsh.
Dublin
abuse victim Marie Collins, who met the cardinal for about an hour last
Sunday night, said the participation of the two bishops sent out “a very, very
bad message”.
This was particularly so as “Bishop O’Mahony has
never shown any regret, nor has he accepted the Murphy report findings”,
she said.
Cardinal O’Malley met Ms Collins and other Dublin abuse
victims at separate meetings in All Hallows College last Sunday night.
He
“appeared sincere and very open”, she said, but “there’s no way of
knowing. I’ve been in that situation many times before.”
Cardinal
O’Malley became archbishop of Boston in 2003 after his predecessor,
Cardinal Bernard Law, resigned following controversy over his handling
of clerical child sex abuse allegations there.
He has been sent by
the pope as apostolic visitor to Dublin “to verify the effectiveness of
the present processes used in responding to cases of abuse”, as he put
it Sunday.
The Murphy report found that Bishop O’Mahony’s
handling of allegations or suspicions of clerical child sexual abuse was
“particularly bad”.
Auxiliary bishop of Dublin from 1975 to 1996, it
found that he was aware of 13 priests against whom there were
allegations or suspicions by 1995.
Last December, one month
following publication of the report, Bishop Walsh offered his
resignation.
That has since been refused by the pope.
Sunday’s
Mass, marking the feast of St Laurence O’Toole, patron of the
archdiocese, was attended by members of the archdiocese’s metropolitan
chapter, which includes senior clergy in the archdiocese.
Bishop O’Mahony is dean of the chapter and Bishop Walsh is its precentor.
Following
publication of the Murphy report, Archbishop Martin asked Bishop
O’Mahony to refrain from publicly administering confirmation and to
cease his association with a charity which brings disabled children to
Lourdes.
SIC: IT/IE