DUBLIN (IRELAND)
Irish Independent [Dublin, Ireland]
September 5, 2024
Societal shock is useless unless it stimulates the right response. Over three decades we have heard deeply disturbing reports about repulsive abuse by members of the Catholic church.
Restitution or atonement, if they came at all, were nowhere near proportionate to the monstrous harm done. Once again we hear a minister insist that religious orders “must put their hands up and come forward” to play their role in uncovering abuse and dealing with redress for victims. Justice Minister Helen McEntee may mean what she says, but we have been here before.
No matter how despicable the crimes, the outrage, anger, reproach, helplessness and revulsion are nothing new. Even messages of empathy and gestures of contrition, without commensurate follow-through, ring hollow.
We are failing, and will continue to fail, as long as the meaningful acts that might make a difference in putting back together the broken lives of survivors are missing.
When it comes to redress and support for survivors, the church must belatedly be compelled to meet its full obligations. No amount of “moral pressure” has been sufficient in the past.
The State demeans itself and lets down survivors if it gets involved in another cat-and-mouse game with the church. We have seen in the past how it leaves the taxpayer on the hook without giving survivors all they need to heal.
The findings of the Scoping Inquiry were appalling. The State has no option but to deploy its full resources through the law and with the help of An Garda Síochána to call to account all who were guilty of the abuses and those involved in cover-ups. There has to be zero tolerance for avoidance of responsibilities.
These abusers were members of the church. The State turned a blind eye. It must make amends, but church institutions bear the bulk of the blame for heinous crimes against defenceless children.
There is general acceptance that the church effectively was given a get-out-of-jail-free card in 2002 in the deal done with the State on child abuse.
As recently as 2017, Richard Bruton, the then education minister, said “moral pressure” would be applied on the religious orders to persuade them to contribute more to the cost of compensating abuse victims.
In the infamous 2002 deal, 18 orders agreed with the State to contribute €128m (IR£100m) in cash and property to the compensation fund, which was then estimated at €250m.
In return, the State would indemnify the orders against lawsuits. While the orders’ contribution was capped at that level, state liability was open-ended. The numbers revealed in the Scoping report may be several times that magnitude.
It has been said that not everything that is faced can be changed. Yet nothing can be changed until it is faced. The church must either face up to the harm and the hurt it has caused or finally be forced to do so.