AT THE GATE OF THE YEAR
AND I SAID TO THE MAN AT THE GATE OF THE YEAR ?GIVE ME A LIGHT THAT I MAY TREAD SAFELY INTO THE UNKNOWN,? AND HE REPLIED, ?GO OUT INTO THE DARKNESS AND PUT YOUR HAND INTO THE HAND OF...
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December 2005 Archives
Last day for abuse claims to Redress Board
Secretary Residential Institutions Redress Board Block 5, Belfield Office Park, Beech Hill Road, Clonskeagh, Dublin 4. 15th December 2005 To day is another milestone towards closure in the Institutions Saga. I know that you and everyone will have been very...
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CATHOLIC CHURCH'S NEW GUIDELINES
Madam, - I wish to reply to points raised in Ms Mary Raftery's column of December 22nd concerning the new Catholic Church policy on child protection. Firstly, Ms Raftery does not appear to have fully read my statement in...
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Church still has not learned
Mary Raftery 22/12/2005 'Trust us, we know best" sums up the new Catholic Church policy on child protection, entitled Our Children, Our Church. What is most shocking about the changed procedures, published last Monday, is that they are actually...
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CATHOLIC CHURCH'S NEW GUIDELINES ON CHILD PROTECTION
Madam - The Ferns Report findings were secured at a desperate cost. If we don't learn from them the investigation's value is eroded and the catalogue of suffering is perpetuated. What is clear from Ferns is that the abuse...
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Priest charged with sex assault on girl
Thursday December 22nd 2005 A CATHOLIC priest appeared in court via videolink yesterday charged with indecent assault and facilitation of the rape of a 12-year-old girl. Fr Jeremiah McGrath (62) appeared at Liverpool Crown Court following his arrest at...
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Diocese paid out ?130,000 to abuse victims in 2004
Wednesday December 21st 2005 Gordon Deegan and David Quinn THE tragedy of abuse by a small number priests has continued to dim the good work of the Catholic Church, the Bishop of Killaloe Dr Willie Walsh said yesterday. He...
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This child protection policy is to be welcomed
Tuesday December 20th 2005 IT MIGHT be said that the first sex scandal to rock the Catholic Church in Ireland was the one involving Bishop Eamonn Casey back in 1992. Since then, a whole series of much worse scandals...
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Clerical abuse to be probed by lay experts
Tuesday December 20th 2005 David Quinn Religious Correspondent CATHOLIC Bishops are to hand over responsibility for the handling of child abuse claims to professionally qualified lay people. The move is part of a radical new child protection policy and...
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New abuse guidelines get mixed response
Patsy McGarry, Religious Affairs Correspondent 20/12/2005 There was a mixed reaction to the child protection guidelines published yesterday by the Irish Catholic Church. Minister of State for Children Brian Lenihan welcomed them as "a step in the right direction"....
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Archbishop pledges to make church 'safe for children'
Patsy McGarry Religious Affairs Correspondent 20/12/2005 Catholic Archbishop Se?n Brady yesterday committed the church in Ireland to implementing child protection guidelines that aim "to ensure that where the church is, children are safe". Archbishop Brady said the guidelines were...
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Lenihan welcomes Church child protection rules
19 December 2005 16:06 The Minister of State at the Department of Health and Children has welcomed the new child protection guidelines unveiled by the Catholic Church earlier today. Brian Lenihan described the policies as a step in the right...
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NORA WALL CASE
IRISH TIMES EDITORIAL, Saturday, 17 December 2005 [ I think this is the first time that the Irish Times has "officially" acknowledged a link between the broadcast of Mary Raftery's States of Fear series in April/May 1999 and the...
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Activist nun in line for award
Monday December 19th 2005 A NUN who has dedicated the last 20 years of her life to community work in her native city is in the final line-up for the Cork Person of the Year award after she won Person...
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Church child abuse guide revamped
Monday December 19th 2005 David Quinn Religious Affairs Correspondent REVAMPED child protection guidelines - the most stringent in the country - are being launched today by the Catholic Church. The new policy will not allow an adult to be...
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RTE & Nora WALL
Tom This is RTE's reply to my Email dated 1st December regarding Nora Wall and Pablo McCabe. I'm not sure why they choose to reply NOW because (despite what Peter Feeney says about his responsibilities), they ignored several previous emails....
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Catholic priests should be allowed to marry.
Bishop calls for end to married clergy ban 18 December 2005 08:09 The Bishop of Killaloe, Willie Walsh, has said that Catholic priests should be allowed to marry. In an interview with the Sunday Tribune newspaper, Bishop Walsh said...
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Claims of abuse hit 14,768 at deadline
John Burns ALMOST 3,000 claims for compensation have been made in less than a week by former residents of orphanages and industrial schools who claim they were abused. This means the state?s compensation bill may have jumped by as...
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Sisters still say no surrender to the spreading concrete sprawl
Sunday December 18th 2005 FIVE aging women live in a convent built, rebuilt, extended and extended again to house at least one hundred nuns. Around them is the enormous clutter of classrooms, yards, corridors, annexes, stairways inside and out, railings,...
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Nora Wall miscarriage of justice confirmed
17/12/2005 The prosecution of a former nun for rape in a case involving evidence from a witness known to be unreliable should not have been brought, a judge has said. The Court of Criminal Appeal earlier this month declared...
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Late final surge of claimants to redress board
Patsy McGarry, Religious Affairs Correspondent 17/12/2005 Compensation for former residents of orphanages and industrial schools who were abused could now cost the taxpayer as much as ?1.15 billion, or more than nine times the ?128 million contribution by religious...
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TOTAL APPLICATIONS
Residential Institutions Redress Board Newsletter December 2005 Friday, 16th December 2005 This is the 12th in a series of newsletters which the Board has decided to produce to keep applicants informed from time to time as to the procedures...
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Catestrophic human wreckage from RIRB 'Gravy' train.
12,000 applications for compensation of alleged abuse in our Industrial schools,1.05 billion euro in compensation and legal costs. We from the Industrial schools know many, if not all of our fellow inmates have made exaggerated and fraudulent claims and...
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Abused have until midnight to lodge a claim with board
David Quinn THE deadline for receipt of applications by the Residential Institutions Redress Board expires at midnight tonight. By then, it is expected that around 12,000 people will have applied for financial compensation for abuse allegedly suffered while resident in...
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Complaints of abuse led to boycott of village shop
09/12/2005 A woman who led a group of four mothers in making complaints about a Franciscan brother, alleging sexual abuse by him of a number of children had her village shop boycotted as a result, the High Court was...
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Priest allowed bail pending sentence
09/12/2005 A Dominican priest has been remanded on bail pending sentence at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court for sexually abusing the son of a parishioner who regularly confided in him The 62-year-old priest, who has two previous convictions for abusing...
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CATHOLIC CHURCH AND CHILD ABUSE
Madam, - I have great sympathy for those Catholic clergy and religious who suffer by association with the few who have sullied the church's name through their abuse of innocent children. How difficult it must be for such men...
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Request for information
Request for information On industrial schools It is NOT the purpose of the Alliance Committee to give any Information on any Industrial School, Names of Brothers, Nuns or Lay persons or any details other than about what is available to...
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THERE CAN BE NO CHANGE
The Labour Party has called on the Minister for Education to extend the remit of the Residential Institutions Redress Board to allow the former residents of more institutions to apply for compensation. The party says some former residents are ineligible...
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Abuse claims flood in for ?1bn payout
Thursday December 8th 2005 David Quinn Religious and Social Affairs Correspondent THE residential institutions Redress Board is currently receiving a staggering 100 applications a day - 10 times the rate this time last year. With the deadline to make applications...
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Ferns shakeout will make the Church more humble, say Redemptorists
Thursday December 8th 2005 David Quinn Religious and Social Affairs Correspondent THE lessons of the Ferns report apply not just to the Church, but to every institution that deals with children, a leading cleric has said. Writing in the...
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Man sues Franciscans and State in abuse case
08/12/2005 A man who claims that from the age of nine he was abused more than 250 times by a Franciscan Brother who taught him at a Galway primary school, has sued the Franciscan Order and the State for...
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Archbishop welcomes State inquiries into alleged abuses
John Downes 08/12/2005 The archbishop of Cashel and Emly, Dr Dermot Clifford, has said he would be "quite happy" for a State investigation into possible abuses to take place in any diocese found to require such an investigation. Speaking at...
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Lift-off for child protection trainers 'a critical step in making Church safe'
Tuesday December 6th 2005 David Quinn Religious Affairs Correspondent THE graduation of the first group of "child protection trainers" is an "important step" in making the Catholic Church a safe environment for children, Archbishop Sean Brady says. Dr Brady...
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Protection policy tops Catholic agenda
Tuesday December 6th 2005 David Quinn Religious Affairs Correspondent THE Church's new child protection policy is topping the agenda at the latest meeting of the Catholic hierarchy in Maynooth. The bishops are still awaiting final recognition from Rome of...
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Sex abuse father can appeal life sentence
Tuesday December 6th 2005 Ann O'Loughlin A GALWAY farmer who was jailed for 10 life terms for the rape and sexual abuse of four of his daughters over a 20-year period was yesterday granted leave to appeal his sentence. The...
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Casey allegation 'lacks foundation'
Tuesday December 6th 2005 David Quinn Religious Affairs Correspondent THE allegation against Bishop Eamon Casey "looks to be without reasonable foundation", and if this turns out to be so he should not have had to stand aside from ministry,...
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Limerick diocese to deal with Bishop Casey probe
Tuesday December 6th 2005 David Quinn ReligiouS Affairs Correspondent THE allegation against former Bishop of Galway Dr Eamonn Casey, that came to light last week, has been passed on to the diocese of Limerick for investigation. The diocese of...
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ISPCC apologises for giving incorrect statistics
Fiona Gartland 06/12/2005 The Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children has apologised to 45,000 homes and businesses that received inaccurate information through the charity's Christmas fundraising mail-out. The charity said it would offer anyone who makes...
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Priest stands aside after complaint
05 December 2005 17:56 A priest in the Diocese of Kerry has stood aside from his ministry after a complaint of inappropriate behaviour towards a man was made against him. The diocese has confirmed to RT? News that the complaint...
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Were religious-run homes adequately funded?
Sunday December 4th 2005 Sir - The article by Bruce Arnold ( Sunday Independent, 20/11/05) 'The Church can't wash its hands of sex abuse scandal' has one major flaw - his assertion that the Institutions were 'adequately' funded, and...
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THE TRIAL OF NORA WALL IN 1999
Sunday Independent August 1st 1999 Kevin Moore on the strange case of Sister Dominic/Nora Wall, whose conviction for the rape of a child was quashed just days after sentencing NORA WALL'S friends and colleagues scoff at the courtroom debacle,...
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BISHOP'S REPUTATION ALREADY TARNISHED
Monday December 5th 2005 Sir, I view with some disquiet the current position concerning Bishop Eamon Casey. Here we have a priest removed from duty on foot of a seemingly obscure complaint which nobody seems to know very much...
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Primate stresses efforts to stop abuse
Primate stresses efforts to stop abuse Ruadh?n Mac Cormaic 05/12/2005 Catholic primate Archbishop Se?n Brady has said he was "appalled, very disheartened and discouraged" on reading the Ferns inquiry report. Ruadh?n Mac Cormaic reports. Speaking to The Irish Times...
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Dangerous desire for condemnation
Sunday December 4th 2005 IT TOOK the jury five hours to reach a verdict. In June 1999, by a majority of 10-2, they found former nun Nora Wall and Paul McCabe guilty of a 1988 rape. On the evidence before...
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Schools, charities lose out over cost of abuse redress
Sunday December 4th 2005 JIM CUSACK THE abuse scandals are rattling the finances of the Catholic Church, forcing it to sell off schools, community centres and playing fields around the country. And while some of the better-off areas of...
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Casey says he's 'devastated' by claims of 'family friend'
Sunday December 4th 2005 MAEVE SHEEHAN THE former Bishop of Galway has told friends that he was devastated by allegations of child abuse against him made by a family friend. The daughter of close friends of Dr Eamonn Casey, the...
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A Paris court overturned paedophilia convictions
PARIS -- A Paris court overturned paedophilia convictions against six people including a priest yesterday after the spectacular collapse of a case that has put the French justice system in the dock. The case first shocked France because of the...
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Protest at treatment of whistle-blower priests
Patsy McGarry, Religious Affairs Correspondent The Body of the Church group, set up to campaign for justice for priests punished by Catholic Church authorities when they alerted them to risks of child sex abuse, is to hold its second...
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HOMOSEXUALITY AND PRIESTHOOD
A chara, - Are Patsy McGarry and Senator David Norris better judges of what the Catholic Church expects of her priests than Pope Benedict? - Yours, etc, Fr TOM INGOLDSBY SDB, Salesian College, Pallaskenry, Co Limerick....
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PABLO McCABE AND NORA WALL
NORA WALL TO DAY Geraldine Kennedy Editor Irish Times I finished this just before the recent remarkable developments in the Nora Wall case. However I don't propose to change it. Irish Times journalists like Mary Raftery and Fintan O'Toole...
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Wall was victim of a miscarriage of justice
01 December 2005 16:04 The Court of Criminal Appeal has certified that the former nun Nora Wall, who was wrongly convicted of rape, has been the victim of a miscarriage of justice. Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns said the court was...
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