Are all irish people to blame for the abuse in the Catholic Church?

stovelid wrote: »

Easy to say it now.

Ask somebody who is typically representative of my parent's generation - in their late 60s/early 70s and from a poor family that grew up in a small Irish rural community about how hard it must have been to challenge the church in your community.

Spacedog wrote: »

Since when the government decided to limit the liability of the Church, long before the extent of the abuse was known, and that it is now known that the church knew the true extent of the abuse (and the projected financial liability) and covered up, then accepted the settlement of liability.

Seems to me that the Irish people were perfectly happy with this situation. We were and ARE all perfectly happy to foot the full bill of liability, through taxation, in a time of recession for crimes we did not commit, did not cover up, and had no control over what so ever.

Those responsible are:

1) The individuals who perpetrated the abuse (many have escaped justice)
2) The Catholic Church upper hierarchy from Archbishops upwards to the Pope in Dublin and in Rome who limited their liability through careful management and manipulation of law, political influence, and public relations.
3) The Public Services and past Government for turning their backs on these crimes and having faith in the Church to do the right thing at it's own expense, instead of following an ethical criminal process. (perhaps for fear of political unpopularity by a still largely faithful public.)
4) The Government of the present for promising action to the reporters and the press, but will say or do nothing else until the next report comes out in 10 years time...
5) The Irish People for being aware of this exact situation long before this report was published, and not having the courage, passion or the balls to demand justice from the perpetrators, or severe financial penalties from the institution that allowed it.

OK Rant Over, mods feel free to lock the thread for flaming like you did with the last one I posted a few weeks ago when the issue didn't matter to anyone...

My name is URL wrote: »

One of the priests was a software developer in the 80's, one of the best in Ireland apparently

He designed a 'game' that groomed the kids, and persuaded them to take off their clothes and kiss him

One day, the mother of one of the children he'd abused arrived to collect her daughter and while standing outside the door heard her child say 'will I put my clothes back on now?'

Just heard that on the radio now...

The point is that if he was 'just' a developer he would have been convicted earlier, he was a priest as well though and as such got the protection that the church and Gardai provided

So no, everyone is not to blame. Only those that actively and knowingly hid the fact that abuse was happening are to blame, though that covers a lot of people

it is abundantly clear, from the Commission‟s investigation as revealed in the cases of the 46 priests in the representative sample (see Chapters 11 to 57), that child sexual abuse by clerics was widespread throughout the period under review.

Of the 46 priests examined, 11 pleaded guilty to or were convicted in the criminal courts of sexual assaults on children.

1.14 The volume of revelations of child sexual abuse by clergy over the past 35 years or so has been described by a Church source as a “tsunami” of sexual abuse. He went on to describe the “tsunami” as “an earthquake deep beneath the surface hidden from view”. The clear implication of that statement is that the Church, in common with the general public, was somehow taken by surprise by the volume of the revelations. Officials of the Archdiocese of Dublin and other Church authorities have repeatedly claimed to have been, prior to the late 1990s, on „a learning curve‟ in relation to the matter. Having completed its investigation, the Commission does not accept the truth of such claims and assertions.

1.15 The Dublin Archdiocese‟s pre-occupations in dealing with cases of child sexual abuse, at least until the mid 1990s, were the maintenance of secrecy, the avoidance of scandal, the protection of the reputation of the Church, and the preservation of its assets. All other considerations, including the welfare of children and justice for victims, were subordinated to these priorities. The Archdiocese did not implement its own canon law rules and did its best to avoid any application of the law of the State.