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	Bishops Quit over Child Abuse Scandal By Ian Collier Herald Sun December 25, 2009 http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/bishops-quit-over-child-abuse-scandal/story-e6frf7jx-1225813622795 TWO more Catholic bishops have resigned in Ireland in the wake of a devastating clerical child abuse inquiry. Eamonn Walsh and Raymond Field bowed to weeks of criticism and pressure, Sky News reported. They announced during Christmas Eve midnight Mass services across Dublin that they planned to quit their posts as auxiliaries in the archdiocese. They are the latest senior clerics to stand down after Bishop of Kildare and Leighlin James Moriarty and Bishop of Limerick Donal Murray resigned over the damning Murphy report. It exposed the Catholic hierarchy's shocking inaction and cover-up of paedophile priests over decades. Bishops Walsh and Field announced their resignations in a statement as church services took place around the country. "As we celebrate the Feast of Christmas, the Birth of our Saviour, the Prince of Peace, it is our hope that our action may help to bring the peace and reconciliation of Jesus Christ to the victims/survivors of child sexual abuse," they said. "We again apologize to them." The bishops added: "Our thoughts and prayers are with those who have so bravely spoken out and those who continue to suffer in silence." The Murphy inquiry, based on a sample 46 priests, revealed a catalogue of paedophilia and subsequent cover-ups over three decades because the Catholic hierarchy was obsessed with secrecy and was effectively granted immunity by the police. Last night in St Mary's Pro-Cathedral in Dublin Archbishop Diarmuid Martin told Mass-goers that the diocese must now be called to renewal by recognizing what happened in the past. "It has been a painful year. But the Church today may well be a better and safer place than was the Church of 25 years ago when all looked well, but where deep shadows were kept buried. "The church in Dublin is called to conversion and to renewal."
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