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Hundreds of Irish Catholic priests 'to be implicated in child abuse report'

Laila

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The Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse has spent nine years looking into allegations from thousands of former pupils of state schools and orphanages, some which date back more than 60 years.

It is due on Wednesday while a second report looking into how sex abuse complaints were handled by the Catholic Church will be published by the commission in the summer.

It is thought that some 500 priests have been implicated in the abuse allegations.

Many thousands of children suffered at the hands of religious orders such as the Christian Brothers and Sisters of Mercy at industrial schools and orphanages. Most of the children were born outside wedlock or came from large impoverished families that could not afford to feed them.

The commission was founded in 2000 following a documentary for Irish television which claimed there was widespread sexual, physical and emotional abuse within Catholic institutions.

Mary Raffety, who produced the programme said the abuse suffered was "way off the scale" and "designed to break children".

At Easter, the Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, said the report would "shock us all".
If all survivors claimed, the Republic could face a bill about £10.8 billion.

Hundreds of Irish Catholic priests 'to be implicated in child abuse report' - Telegraph

I hope justice is served for all the victims.
 
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Irish State 'colluded with religious authorities to hide child abuse'

The Irish State colluded with the religious authorities to cover up child abuse that was "endemic" in Catholic-run schools and care homes for 70 years, a devastating report concluded today.

The Child Abuse Commission catalogued sexual, physical and emotional abuse inflicted on 35,000 disadvantaged, neglected and abandoned children by both religious and lay staff over the last 70 years.

The long-awaited report of the decade-long inquiry was launched today amid controversy and recrimination, when victims were barred from a Dublin venue and police were called.

Angry exchanges took place between Commission staff and victims of abuse, who complain that no abusers will be prosecuted as a result of the inquiry.

Irish State 'colluded with religious authorities to hide child abuse', report says - Times Online
 
I hope justice is served for all the victims.

There is no justice for crimes like this. There's nothing that can set the damage right, and there's nothing that can balance the scales.

There is only recovery for the victims, and stopping these monsters from committing these crimes again. Call me cynical, but I do not see the Church doing much on either front that they are not forced to do.
 
There is no justice for crimes like this. There's nothing that can set the damage right, and there's nothing that can balance the scales.

There is only recovery for the victims, and stopping these monsters from committing these crimes again. Call me cynical, but I do not see the Church doing much on either front that they are not forced to do.

Angry exchanges took place between Commission staff and victims of abuse, who complain that no abusers will be prosecuted as a result of the inquiry.

:shock:

I'm afraid you may be right, the news report state that many of the abused orphans fled Ireland and settled within UK. No surprise really.
If i was the abused, i'd want the priests behind bars. Such a shame that justice will not be served for no one. Who protects children in Ireland? They failed

And another thing i am confused on. Someone please explain to me why the Church is not handing out money [Its not like the Vatican is broke] and it instead is the Government??

I just turned off the news channel, the stories of the victims was making me feel ill.
 
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I'd like to see the Catholic church suffer severely from this (monetarily). The abuse that occurred in the US was the last straw for me in leaving the Catholic church. The Church needs to suffer consequences as a result of the behavior of its priests. Christian values? My ass. I'm absolutely disgusted, which is putting it mildly.
 
Truly disgusting, and heart-wrenching.

The worst part of this is often these children are turning to a priest for love and protection, often because they already come from abusive backgrounds and have nowhere to turn. The actions of these horrendous excuses for human beings cause permanent, irrevocable emotional damage. The bastards.

Sidenote: I watched the movie "Doubt" on Sunday, which was an interesting story on the subject. While it was somewhat vague (hence the name?) and not exactly Oscar worthy, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Meryl Streep and Amy Adams put in some excellent performances.
 
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Thousands beaten, raped in Irish reform schools

Thousands beaten, raped in Irish reform schools

Nine years in the making, Wednesday's 2,600-page report sides almost completely with the horrific reports of abuse from former students sent to more than 250 church-run, mostly residential institutions. But victims' leaders said it didn't go far enough — particularly because none of their abusers were identified by name.

The report concluded that church officials always shielded their orders' pedophiles from arrest to protect their own reputations and, according to documents uncovered in the Vatican, knew that many pedophiles were serial attackers.

The investigators said overwhelming, consistent testimony from still-traumatized men and women, now in their 50s to 80s, had demonstrated beyond a doubt that the entire system treated children more like prison inmates and slaves than people with legal rights and human potential.

"A climate of fear, created by pervasive, excessive and arbitrary punishment, permeated most of the institutions and all those run for boys.

More than 30,000 children deemed to be petty thieves, truants or from dysfunctional families — a category that often included unmarried mothers — were sent to Ireland's austere network of industrial schools, reformatories, orphanages and hostels from the 1930s until the last church-run facilities shut in the 1990s.

The Irish government already has funded a parallel compensation system that has paid 12,000 abuse victims an average of euro65,000 ($90,000). About 2,000 claims remain outstanding.

Victims receive the payouts only if they waive their rights to sue the state and the church. Hundreds have rejected that condition and taken their abusers and those church employers to court.

Why isn't the government doing the right thing for it's people and instead of giving the victims hush hush money send the sickos who molested thousands to jail?
 
So-called priests deserve the death penalty

These So-called priests deserve the death penalty !! Also the Nuns who were directly involved with rape deserve the death penalty. Those who covered up and helped these scum of the earth deserve life in prison!!!

The method of execution should be death by fire - BURN BURN BURN in hell you filthy scum !!!!
 
Re: Thousands beaten, raped in Irish reform schools

Why isn't the government doing the right thing for it's people and instead of giving the victims hush hush money send the sickos who molested thousands to jail?

The Government is so corrupt if it cannot even jail pedophiles. Priests or not. The law still applies to them.
EU law should step in and sort them out.
 
Most of the perpetrators are probably 'retired' from the church, drawing a pension. The least the church should do is stop supporting them financially....
And the state should name them. If they won't, the victims should....
 
There is no justice for crimes like this. There's nothing that can set the damage right, and there's nothing that can balance the scales.

There is only recovery for the victims, and stopping these monsters from committing these crimes again. Call me cynical, but I do not see the Church doing much on either front that they are not forced to do.

SO true. I think the Catholic Church is going to become essentially meaningless over the next 10 years as a result of decisions like this. They've basically made themselves irrelevant to the vast majority of the world. I know that there has to be major distress in Ireland, where so much of the population is so devoutly religious, and has been harmed so greatly.

The loss of faith is hard.
 
Most of the perpetrators are probably 'retired' from the church, drawing a pension. The least the church should do is stop supporting them financially....
And the state should name them. If they won't, the victims should....

I wonder if there is a statute of limitations on child molestation in Ireland. Ideally, they should be prosecuted.
 
Re: Thousands beaten, raped in Irish reform schools

The Government is so corrupt if it cannot even jail pedophiles. Priests or not. The law still applies to them.
EU law should step in and sort them out.

I was not ware that was " EU LAW" governing non economic crimnal activity ????!
 
If Canon law didn't superceed normal societies laws then they would not have the motivation or ability to cover these things up for decades.

How many Catholics used these laws to knowingly brush these horrible atrocities under the carpet?
 
The most interesting response to this report was made by the newly appointed Archbishop of Westminster, the Most Reverend Vincent Nichols.

You can read it in my thread, "The Rape of Irish Children" in religion and philosophy.

For me he typifies the current crop of turd that inhabit this church.

Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come onto me.
 
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