Reading the newspapers in New York last week Irish actor Gabriel Byrne said he was shocked at a report that that former archbishop of Dublin John Charles McQuaid was the subject of at least two child sex abuse complaints, although perhaps not surprised.
"If a criminal is in charge of the Catholic Church, what hope was there for the rest of it?" Byrne asks. "It's an endless story."
It is.
If there are files on the alleged crimes of John Charles McQuaid can they be made public?
Allowing people call him 'Your Grace', kissing his ring and then the pomposity of the 'John Charles' title.
Should it not have made sense we were dealing with a spoof and probably worse.
But there were the people who were afraid, the sycophants, and the silly people too.
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3 comments:
so you are prosecutor with no evidence, jury who is completely swayed by the latest moral panic, and judge who hates the defendant. Your readers will find here - http://thethirstygargoyle.blogspot.com/2011/12/smoke-alarms-ring-even-when-theres-no.html - an objective and just evaluation of the accusations against the archbishop which does not jump to a conclusion either way.
Thank you for your comment.
I 'prosecute' no-one. If there are files, then maybe we should see them.
I lived through the terror of the archbishop. I also know something about the anonymity which thrived during his period as archbishop of Dublin, an anonymity which is alive and well in the Catholic Church today.
I have lived through the terror of 'secrecy'.
I jump to no conclusions about the allegations but I do know what I saw and experienced.
A note to the anonymous person who left a comment on this entry.
The report in Saturday's Irish Times re Dutch priests abused 'up to 20,000 children' between 1945 and 1985.
And then the photograph of the bishop with is ring and chain.
Part of the oxygen that alows what happens to go on is the misplaced secrecy, anonymity and an arrogance that confuses and dmages so many priests.
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