The response of the Cloyne diocese to complaints and allegations of
clerical child sexual abuse in the period 1996 to February 1st, 2009 was
inadequate and inappropriate.
All the allegations were made after
1996, when the church had put in place procedures for handling child
sexual abuse complaints.
The reaction of the Vatican to these
procedures was “entirely unhelpful”, and gave individual Irish bishops
the freedom to ignore the procedures that they had agreed.
The
Vatican’s stance also gave “comfort and support” to those, like Msgr
Denis O’Callaghan, who dissented from official church policy.
The response of the Garda was, with a few exceptions, adequate and appropriate.
The
response of the health authorities was adequate and appropriate “given
the information available to them and limited powers which they have”.
The commission is not convinced the State’s laws and guidelines are sufficiently strong and clear for protecting children.
The
Bishop of Cloyne, John Magee, was ineffective and appeared to take
little real interest in the implementation of existing church guidelines
on child sexual abuse for 12 years.
Msgr O’Callaghan, charged
with investigating abuse claims against priests, was “uncommitted” to
the guidelines, frustrated their implementation and acted in what he
perceived were the best interests of the church.
The report
describes the handling of “allegations, complaints, suspicions and
concerns” about child sexual abuse in respect of 19 clerics.
One of these, and the only person named, is Bishop Magee.
Nine of the complaints that should have been reported to the Garda were not reported.
None of the complaints between 1996 and 2008 was reported to the Health Service Executive.
A
complaint about Bishop Magee was dealt with appropriately but
illustrated the need to have a clear mechanism for dealing with
complaints against bishops.
In the complaint, a young man alleged
Bishop Magee embraced him for a minute. Bishop Magee was shocked at the
interpretation of his actions and said he was providing comfort to a
young man with family difficulties.