IRELAND
Irish Independent
LAST WEEK, it was revealed that 43 primary and post-primary teachers have been suspended from work over the past 10 years because of sex abuse allegations.
There was hardly a murmur of reaction. The same day that news of the suspended teachers broke in the Irish Independent, the Government announced the terms of reference for the inquiry into child abuse in the Dublin archdiocese and the airwaves filled up with this topic again. The teachers didn't get a look-in.
Why the seemingly endless interest in clerical sex abusers, and the nearly zero interest in other categories ofchild abusers?
The chief reason, one presumes, is the former over-arching power of the Catholic Church in Ireland.
This power not alone provided cover for the abusers in its ranks, it also made it almost impossible for their abuse to be revealed.