The “it” referred to was being molested, stripped naked, raped and drugged, “amid an atmosphere of terror and silence”.
As many as 40,000 children may have suffered such acts, according to the Scoping Inquiry report.
Those believed responsible were members of our “holy orders”.
The excoriating report was ordered following harrowing accounts of abuse at Blackrock College.
But a dam-burst of allegations led to it being extended to include some 308 schools, with claims against 884 alleged abusers.
For several decades, there has been a void in both compassion and justice when it came to making the church fully atone for the suffering its members inflicted on the children it undertook to care for.
Those charged with protecting them, preyed on them.
That the majority did not abuse and were honourable is a point that needs making. But even they, though blameless, find themselves cast in the shadow by the behaviour of the institution as a whole.
Systemic cover-ups and the tendency to fall back on the law, rather than follow its own teachings on compassion, have left a terrible void where trust and faith once flourished.
Pain and isolation were intensified by the denial and distancing from full responsibility. Those in desperate need of help met a conspiracy of betrayal and silence.
Though wronged and marginalised, there was nowhere to turn, and no safe place. The report says: “For some, this has led to lifelong estrangement or difficult family relationships.”
Survivors, we are told, can sometimes find forgiveness for those who did them even the most profound harm, if they see genuine restitution on the part of the guilty.
But when the abusers are all long dead, having avoided responsibility for the trauma they left in their wake, it is surely up to the State to do what it can to address the hurt, and attempt to right a monstrous wrong.
Delivering the report, Education Minister Norma Foley spoke of the lasting impact on the lives of those survivors, which cannot be overstated.
The key recommendation is the setting up of a “Commission of Investigation” which has been accepted by the Government.
But perhaps more urgent still is addressing the immediate needs of survivors and offering them restitution, in as much as that is possible. Recognising the harm done is crucial.
We also need to ask: how did a patina of piety become so irresistible as to compel total, unquestioning obedience that allowed abuse to become so pervasive?
How, too, was it possible for paedophiles to unleash such devastation in classrooms all over the country, with impunity?
A state constitutionally committed to cherish the family nonetheless failed to prevent the most heinous crimes against innocent children.
If our State has a “dark conscience” over decades, it can only be addressed by admitting new light.
If – and it is hard to conclude otherwise – there has been a calculated history of secrecy, we owe it to survivors, and to ourselves, to take the lid off, once and for all.