“A Vatican department advised Ireland's Catholic bishops in 1997 not to report priests suspected of child abuse to the police, a newly revealed letter shows.
Obtained by Irish broadcaster RTE, the letter shows Vatican officials rejected an initiative to begin the "mandatory reporting" of abuse claims.
The proposed policy "gives rise to serious reservations", it says.
The Vatican has persistently said it never instructed bishops to withhold suspicions or evidence of crimes. (My emphasis)
Abuse victims in Ireland and the US said the letter, which RTE said it had received from an Irish bishop, was a "smoking gun" that would serve as important evidence in lawsuits against the Church.” BBC Online 19/1/2011
"The letter is of huge international significance," said Colm O'Gorman, director of the Irish section of Amnesty International. "It shows that the Vatican's intention is to prevent reporting of abuse to criminal authorities. And if that instruction applied here [in Ireland], it applied everywhere." (my emphasis)
Joelle Casteix, a director of the US advocacy group Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, described it as "the smoking gun we've been looking for." It was certain to be cited by lawyers acting for victims seeking to pin responsibility directly on Rome, not the dioceses.
To this day, the Vatican has not endorsed any of the Irish church's three documents since 1996 on safeguarding children. Irish taxpayers, rather than the church, have paid most of the €1.5bn to more than 14,000 abuse claimants dating back to the 1940s.” Guardian 19/1/2011
That the Vatican has lied will not come as a surprise to anyone who has followed this appalling tale. That these lies helped protect serial paedophiles among their priests is doubly shocking. That these priests then went on to abuse many, many more children shows the depths of depravity sanctioned by the Catholic Church.
Why anyone gives these so called holy men the time of day is astonishing. Every time one or other of them appear on the media to pontificate about something or other they should be introduced as a representative of a criminal paedophile friendly organisation.
The evidence of a cover up surely means there must be court cases to follow. Mustn't there?
No comments:
Post a Comment