Our Mission
Our Goals
Our Record
Who We Are
Where We Are
Child Protection
Survivor Support
Survivor Testimony
Clergy Support
Positions
Educating Ourselves
Coming Events
History
Site Index
Contact Us
Links |
Meeting of Irish bishops with Pope Benedict XVI, Feb 15 & 16, 2010
From the
statement issued on February 16th it appears that this meeting has
achieved nothing of significance and may even represent a retreat from
the position adopted by the Irish bishops on December 9th, 2009.
Then the
Irish bishops had accepted that there had been a 'widespread culture' of
covering up abuse in the Irish church. There is no use of the
phrase 'cover up' in the Vatican statement of Feb 16th, 2010.
Instead we have the usual language of minimisation of the cover up - as
a 'failure ... to act effectively' and as 'errors of judgement and
omissions'.
Nor is
there any statement of intent on the part of the Holy See to investigate
and explain these 'failures'.
This is
ominous. We must wait for the papal pastoral letter to Ireland
(due by March 8th?) to reach a final conclusion on this disappointing
meeting. In the meantime we must simply repeat what we have
already said on January 21st about what this pastoral will need to
address if it is to halt the rapid decline in the moral authority of the
leadership of the Catholic Church in Ireland.
See this
statement immediately below.
VOTFI statement on the
pending papal pastoral letter to Ireland - 21st Jan, 2010
The moral authority of
the papacy in Ireland, and of Catholic bishops here, is likely to
collapse if the promised papal pastoral letter to Ireland does not
squarely address the issue of the widespread cover up by bishops of the
outrage of clerical child sexual abuse.
Despite the strong leadership shown by Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of
Dublin, the prestige and authority of Catholic bishops in Ireland, and
of the papacy, continue to decline in the wake of the Murphy report of
November 26, 2009.
Especially damaging was the admission by the Irish Catholic Bishops'
Conference on December 9th, 2009 that the Murphy report indicated a
widespread culture of covering up of clerical child sexual abuse in the
church.
This should have been followed by the immediate resignation of all Irish
bishops who had participated in or acceded to this cover up. It should
also have triggered an immediate declaration from the papacy that this
cover up would be investigated and explained - especially because it is
well known to the faithful that this problem extends well beyond
Ireland, and implicates the universal
Church and its governance from Rome.
The reluctance of implicated bishops to resign, and the failure of the
papacy to declare any such intent, have so seriously damaged the moral
prestige of the office of Catholic bishops, and of the papacy, that
recovery may already be impossible. We are alarmed also at reports that
the promised papal pastoral may go no further than to repeat empty
condemnations of clerical sex abuse, without fully addressing the issue
of betrayal of children by bishops.
We therefore call urgently upon the Irish Catholic Bishops'
Conference:
To request the papacy to initiate a thorough inquiry into all aspects of
the outrage of clerical child sexual abuse, especially the covering up
of this outrage by bishops;
To request the Pope to declare an intention to do this in his promised
pastoral letter to Ireland;
To assure the Pope that without such a declaration this pastoral will
fail to grasp the scale of the crisis, and will fail also to initiate a
recovery of the Catholic church in Ireland;
To ensure that a thorough investigation of all remaining Irish dioceses
is undertaken, to determine whether the evils of abuse and cover up
revealed in the Murphy Report are prevalent elsewhere;
To establish a National Forum for survivors of clerical abuse, and for
their supporters, to help respond to their pastoral needs;
To request the immediate resignations of all Irish bishops implicated in
the cover up of clerical child sex abuse.
Our
Challenge to Bishop Seamus Hegarty of Derry, 31st Dec 2009
VOTFI STATEMENT ON MURPHY REPORT ON CLERICAL CHILD ABUSE IN THE
CATHOLIC ARCHDIOCESE OF DUBLIN
For those whose minds are not closed this report is conclusive proof of
the complete failure of a system of church governance that has caused
intense trauma to thousands of Catholic children throughout the world.
So far the response to the report by Irish Bishops, and by the Holy See,
tells us that too many minds are still closed. No bishop has yet
admitted what all of us can plainly see: their unaccountable and
aristocratic system of governing the church has failed our children and
disgraced the Catholic community of faith throughout the world.
In the wake of reports on Ferns in 2005, and on Cloyne in 2008 - and a
tide of similar revelations in over twenty other countries - this
devastating report on the Archdiocese of Dublin can lead to only one
conclusion. The absolute and unchecked administrative power that
Catholic bishops have acquired not from God but from history tends
inexorably towards their corruption.
For the sake of all other Irish victims of clerical abuse, known and
unknown, this revelation now demands an inquiry into the remaining
twenty-three Irish dioceses.
The complete
statement.
The lay apostolate ...
is a participation in the saving mission of the Church itself.
Through their baptism and confirmation, all are commissioned to that
apostolate by the Lord Himself. (Vatican II Decree on the
Apostolate of the Laity.)
|
|
Papal Pastoral Letter to Ireland in 2010: What will this mean?
From clues dropped by
emeritus professor Vincent Twomey of Maynooth and Archbishop Diarmuid
Martin of Dublin, it seems that the papal pastoral letter may sanction a
reorganisation of the Irish Catholic Church.
This may involve the
amalgamation of dioceses, to form far fewer but larger dioceses.
The thinking may be that this may in time improve the quality of Irish
bishops.
However, we do not yet
know whether the pastoral will deal adequately with the biggest problem
posed by the events of 2009 - the shattered relationship between Irish
bishops and their people.
Repairing that
relationship will require
something that has been missing for decades: honest dialogue
between bishops and people.
Will this pastoral
letter call
for such dialogue? Will it grapple with the need for permanent
diocesan structures for lay people, within which such dialogue can take
place, on a regular basis?
Or will it simply give
patriarchy a superficial makeover - hoping we will all be content with fewer more
powerful bishops, as
unaccountable to their people as Irish bishops have
always been?
We don't know. We
can only hope the pope has read our open letter to him (below), that he
will read the statement alongside, and that the pastoral will not ignore
the questions we pose.
Open Letter to His Holiness,
Pope Benedict XVI
Reflecting on the content of the report of the Irish state inquiry
into clerical child sex abuse in the Archdiocese of Dublin, Ireland
Your Holiness,
Once again our church has been most grievously shocked and mystified to
learn of the endangerment of thousands of Catholic children by senior
bishops, to whom was given by Our Lord the instruction “feed my lambs.”
This situation is painfully familiar. Repeating the tragedy of Boston,
Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Ferns, Cloyne, Sydney and so many other
dioceses worldwide, four archbishops of Ireland’s most populous diocese
have behaved in a manner that facilitated the deepest psychological,
emotional and spiritual trauma to many children. They have also
endangered gravely the divine mission of the church, as well as the
souls once more repelled from it.
This, and the fact that such misgovernance has been revealed only by
outside agencies of accountability, not by the Catholic Church itself,
must surely compel Church leadership to consider the following
questions:
* Why have so many bishops behaved secretly in this way, without check
or hindrance, in over twenty countries, for decades?
* How can we ensure that a culture of Christian openness,
accountability
and safety will henceforward prevail at all levels of church
administration in all dioceses?
* How can we measure and address the pain of countless victims?
You yourself declared to the bishops of Ireland at their last Ad Limina
visit of 2006:
“The wounds caused by such acts run deep, and it is an urgent task to
rebuild confidence and trust where these have been damaged. In your
continuing efforts to deal effectively with this problem, it is
important to establish the truth of what happened in the past, to take
whatever steps are necessary to prevent it from occurring again, to
ensure that the principles of justice are fully respected and, above
all, to bring healing to the victims and to all those affected by these
egregious crimes."
The time to act is now. The secrecy must come to an end. We are
convinced that this programme cannot be speedily achieved in Ireland or
elsewhere without the deployment of the full authority of your own
office. We hope also that your own determination in this regard is
unquestionable, and ask you urgently:
1 To institute a thorough church-wide inquiry into all aspects of the
clerical child abuse catastrophe, including the reasons why so many
bishops endangered so many children by their failure to act decisively
against sexual predators.
2 To publish the findings of that inquiry for the enlightenment of the
church and the world.
3 To note the call for a ‘culture of accountability’ in the church by
the Irish National Board for the Safeguarding of Children, and the
observation made by Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin on the feast of
the Epiphany 2009 that "We have to have a system whereby people are
pushed to be accountable.”
4 To begin the task of ensuring that the administrative structures of
the church do not continue to fall so far short of what is now so
obviously necessary to protect its most vulnerable and innocent
members. This will require the practical implementation of this
Christian principle of accountability.
5 To accept that this principle of accountability cannot be achieved
while so many bishops and archbishops, who have knowingly over a
considerable period of time permitted this tragedy to persist, continue
in office. It is time to remove the enablers and replace them with
bishops who will take seriously their responsibility to the People of
God, and especially to Children.
You yourself have outlined these principles of truth, justice and
healing. We believe that all three principles are blessed and supported
by the Most Holy Trinity, and that these five steps are essential if
these principles are to prevail. Action must be taken and it is now up
to you.
Yours respectfully,
Sean O'Conaill
Acting Coordinator
Voice of the Faithful (Ireland)
|
VOTF™
Mission Statement
To provide a prayerful voice, attentive to the Spirit,
through which the Faithful can actively participate in the governance
and guidance of the Catholic Church.
Our Goals
1. To support
survivors of clergy sexual abuse.
2. To support priests of integrity
3.To shape structural change within the Catholic Church.
|
