BishopAccountability.org
	Sinead Ryan: Church Had No Compassion for Parents Going through Hell By Sinead Ryan Herald November 27, 2009 http://www.herald.ie/opinion/columnists/sinead-ryan/sinead-ryan-church-had-no-compassion-for-parents-going-through-hell-1956310.html Here's a question which is awful, but think about it anyway: what would you do if your eight-year-old came home from school today full of news that he had been practising for his first Holy Communion? What though, if the news was that the priest had given him an important job of filling the holy water font in the sacristy, and gone in to show him how, but something funny happened. The priest began touching him. He knows 'good' touching from 'bad' because teacher has explained it. This was definitely bad. It was in his pants and the priest's hand was big and rough and made him cry. Would you die of shock? Call the principal? The bishop? The gardai? Get on the internet? Text your husband to come home immediately and tell every mother in the class? What organisations would you call? Imagine none of those options were available to you. Imagine that nobody believed you or your child. Imagine if your child hadn't been taught 'good' and 'bad' touching and didn't even have the words to explain what had happened. Imagine if you'd never even heard of it yourself. Imagine you were then told he was wrong and you were wrong. Nothing happened and children make things up all the time. Imagine that every single person you told turned you away and told you to forget about it. In Dublin alone, 183 priests abused hundreds and hundreds of small children. We will never know how many. Even Archbishop Diarmuid Martin says the number is "unquantifiable". Aside from the childrenwho suffered those unbelievably painful acts, there are thousands of mothers, fathers, siblings, spouses and children of those children whose lives have been forever changed. We were told there was worse to come and we didn't believe that was possible. It is. Any mother of any child is feeling immense pain today. It is irrelevant that their own child has only known love and protection in their short lives. Any mother feels for every child. Countless parents were ignored, denied, failed and threatened by the very priests that bishops so enthusiastically protected and even promoted. They were met not with compassion but brick walls. Anger, denial, and when it all became too obvious, money. Something at least that the church has in bucket-loads. Where it lacks empathy, concern and kindness, it makes up for in palaces, paintings and gold. Today's parents have choices and power that previous generations did not. The range of communication methods alone is profound. The agencies of the State now have open doors, albeit not nearly enough of the time. Think of the mums and dads who, when faced with the shocking story told by a small, abused child, coped. Diarmuid Martin is a good man. He showed remorse for something for which he is responsible and yet is not his fault. Far better it would have been if one of the few remaining bishops actually responsible for the outrageous cover up to be put in front of the harsh media lights for interrogation. This report has been a long time coming. We might have closure but we do not have justice.
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