PATSY McGARRY and PADDY AGNEW
The Irish Times. 12th August, 2010
Dublin’s catholic archdiocese last night confirmed that offers of resignation by auxiliary bishops Eamonn Walsh and Ray Field had not been accepted by Pope Benedict XVI.
A spokeswoman said there would be no comment from Archbishop Diarmuid Martin on the decision by the Vatican not to accept the resignations, submitted last Christmas Eve.
Senior Vatican figures are said to be concerned about the possibility of a “domino effect” if it were to emerge that other Irish bishops had mishandled allegations of clerical child sex abuse cases, and this is understood to have played a part in Pope Benedict’s decision.
To a certain extent, the pope has opted to differentiate between sins of “omission” and sins of “commission” in relation to the clerical sex abuse scandals, Vatican observers also said.
Yesterday Vatican spokesman Fr Federico Lombardi said it was not policy to comment on resignations which had not been accepted.
Vatican sources said the Secretariat of State had recalled the excellent work done by Bishop Walsh in the role of apostolic administrator in the diocese of Ferns. The decision not to accept the resignations is in line with the decision of the Archbishop of Armagh, Cardinal Seán Brady, last spring not to resign despite his involvement in an investigation 35 years ago of a case involving Brendan Smyth.
The three-page letter revealing the Vatican’s decision, which was sent by Archbishop Martin to his priests, deals mainly with preparation and arrangements for Baptism and Confirmation.
In a two-line reference to the auxiliary bishops the letter, which was leaked to the Irish Catholic newspaper, said that: “Following the presentation of their resignations to Pope Benedict it has been decided that Bishop Eamonn Walsh and Bishop Raymond Field will remain as Auxiliary Bishops and are to be assigned revised responsibilities within the diocese. This means they will be available to administer Confirmation in any part of the diocese in the coming year.”
The two bishops had been continuing in their normal duties pending the decision.
Two other bishops named in the Murphy report – Bishop Donal Murray and Bishop Jim Moriarty – have had offers of resignation accepted by the Vatican. A fifth bishop named in the report, Bishop Martin Drennan of Galway, has resisted calls for his resignation.
Abuse survivor Marie Collins strongly criticised the Vatican’s decision, saying she was “at a loss” and “past being angry”.
She said there was no hope that the hierarchy or the pope were going to change anything. The church was not “going to be accountable or take responsibility”. She felt “people, survivors in particular, are also entitled to an explanation as to why Bishop Moriarty’s resignation was accepted but Bishop Walsh’s and Bishop Field’s were not”.
Another Dublin abuse survivor, Andrew Madden, said reports that Pope Benedict had not accepted the offers of resignation were “no surprise”.
He said that “since the Murphy report was published the Catholic Church in Ireland and at Vatican level has failed to take responsibility for the findings of that report, in particular the finding that sexual abuse of children by priests was covered up by archbishops and bishops for decades”.
He continued: “Pope Benedict and Cardinal Brady both failed to protect children from priests they knew to be abusers and in both cases those priests went on to abuse more children.”
there are good people out there who believe the catholic faith but it is so sad they have bad people leading their church
mmaguire they can see what they like
it is their eyes
their neglect
their abuse
their filth
their lies
their greed
their corruption
their denial
So it’s business as usual at the Vatican. Is anyone remotely surprised by this?
The present pope seems to lack all decency and has no brain to think either. How did he manage to get that position?? I suppose it is because they lack in competition between all those senil cardinals!!
The whole Catholic church is just an enormous hypocrisy. One who has suffered from their indoctrination.
The Pope and the Vativan can do whatever it likes.It,like the Irish Government,Empires and the very rich and powerful will not be held to account.The Vatican does not know what justice is.Remember this is an organisation steeped in violence and murderous acts: the inquisition,the extermination of millions of indiginous people in Central America and South America and all the other indiginous races round the world.The Church was also involved in carving up Africa and profiting from the slave trade.Razzinger is a criminal who has conspired in covering up sexual abuse of children and is harbouring another criminal called Bernard Law, former cardinal of Boston who is wanted for questioning by a grand jury in Boston. Razzinger gave him a new job in Rome.People are too indoctrinated and trained from a very early age to repect these dysfunctional authorities.Is it any wonder that it took decades for the horrors that were inflicted on thousands of Irish children to come to light.Sadly,the Irish Government is incapable of even making a response to such an important issue as this.People thought the Berlin wall would never come down, so there is some hope that someday this organisation called the Vatican will lose it’s hold ov
Hi:
Not simply that
VATICANT
http://www.twitter.com/MrPaddyDoyle
You can see that their strategy is over time one of
“nihil carborundum illegitimi”
and the victims are seen through the eyes of the Vatican as the “illegitimi”
It’s up to Diarmuid Martin now. Should he stay or should he go? Some would say he’s put up a good fight and has just been knocked out.
It’s obvious that the Irish hierarchy is incapable of reform, not to be trusted around or near vulnerable communities; indeed this organisation of celibate men remains a danger to our children.
Patsy McGarry puts it succinctly:
Let us remember how the Murphy report found that every single auxiliary bishop in Dublin over the period investigated HAD knowledge of incidents of the crime that is clerical child sex abuse in the archdiocese. When the report was published last November FIVE of those auxiliary bishops were STILL serving. They included:
Bishop Donal Murray of Limerick, who resigned on December 18th;
Bishop of Galway Martin Drennan, appointed an auxiliary bishop of Dublin in September 1997 on the same day as Dublin auxiliary bishop Ray Field;
bishops Walsh and Moriarty.
So why were the resignations of bishops Murray and Moriarty accepted by the pope while those of bishops Walsh and Field were not?
Bishop Drennan, of course, never offered to resign.
The main finding of the Murphy report, where clerical child sex abuse and the Dublin archdiocese was concerned, was UNEQUIVOCAL. It said: “The Commission has NO DOUBT that clerical child sexual abuse was covered up by the Archdiocese of Dublin and other Church authorities over much of the period covered by the commission’s remit. The welfare of children, which should have been the first priority, WAS NOT EVEN A FACTOR TO BE CONSIDERED in the early stages. Instead the focus was on
the avoidance of scandal
the preservation of the good name, status and assets of the institution and of what the institution regarded as its most important members – the priests”.
Bishops Walsh, Field and Drennan, as well as bishops Moriarty and Murray, were ALL part of the regime which oversaw that cover-up. They met regularly to discuss management of the archdiocese and those discussions included addressing, or not, allegations of clerical child sex abuse. ALL were party to the cover-up. And, in case some conclude that the cover-up applied only to the early years of the period investigated, it should be remembered that criticisms of Bishop Field in the report refer to a case in 2003.
What we are witnessing here is not simply a double standard, but an exercise in moral bankruptcy.