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	Cardinal under Pressure over Failure to Challenge Culture of Secrecy Meath Chronicle March 18, 2010 http://www.meathchronicle.ie/opinion/comment/articles/2010/03/18/3995664-cardinal-under-pressure-over-failure-to-challenge-culture-of-secrecy/ IRELAND -- The tumultuous fallout from the clerical abuse scandals that have dogged the Irish Catholic Church for more than a decade could yet claim the Primate of All-Ireland, Cardinal Sean Brady, as pressure continues to grow on him to step down over his actions in enforcing secrecy on child victims of the notorious paedophile priest Brendan Smyth. Smyth, it will be remembered, was a child molester responsible for depraved acts of indecency, abuse and rape of children over many years. He was already indirectly responsible for the fall of Albert Reynolds' coalition government in 1994 when it was discovered a warrant for his extradition to Northern Ireland had lain in the Attorney General's office for seven months without being acted upon, leading to the collapse of the Fianna Fail-Labour coalition. It is almost unbelievable that, 16 years later, the Smyth case is making front page headlines all over again and, this time, it may well claim the head of the most senior figure in the Irish hierarchy over claims that date back to the mid-1970s. At that time, the then Fr Brady was a part-time secretary to the then Bishop of Kilmore, Dr Francis McKiernan, and was asked by the bishop to conduct a canonical enquiry into an allegation of child sexual abuse which was made by a boy in Dundalk, concerning the Norbertine priest. Because he held a doctorate in Canon Law, Fr Brady was asked to conduct this enquiry, but says he had no decision-making powers regarding the outcome of the enquiry. Bishop McKiernan held this responsibility. In March 1975, Fr Brady and two other priests interviewed a boy and his role was to take notes. A couple of weeks later, Fr Brady interviewed a second boy in Ballyjamesduff. On this occasion, Fr Brady conducted the inquiry by himself. According to the Irish Bishops' Conference, at the end of both interviews, the boys were asked to confirm by oath the truthfulness of their statements and that they would preserve the confidentiality of the interview process. "The intention of this oath was to avoid potential collusion in the gathering of the inquiry's evidence and to ensure that the process was robust enough to withstand challenge by the perpetrator, Fr Brendan Smyth," a statement from the conference emphasised this week. A week later, Fr Brady passed his findings to Bishop McKiernan for his immediate action. Abuse survivors say that, by his actions, Fr Brady must resign his position, saying he was implicated in the covering up of a paedophile priest. They say he no longer has either the moral authority or credibility to deal with the fallout from the abuse crisis within the Church here. The cardinal has denied being involved in any cover up and has resisted calls for his resignation, saying he does not believe this to be a resigning matter. But abuse survivors say his actions cannot be excused simply by the prevailing culture of the time. However, Dr Brady faces imminent legal action by a rape victim of Smyth who is suing him in a personal capacity and as Catholic primate over his failure to alert the civil authories to Smyth's actions, allowing the paedophile to continue his reign of terror. Dr Brady has fallen back on the defence of passing responsibility for taking action to his bishop, claiming he was merely carrying out the orders of his superior. The difficulty for Dr Brady is that, in December 2009, he said in an interview that, if he found himself in a position where he was aware that any failure to act on his part had allowed other children to be abused, he would resign. By not bringing his information to the Gardai at the time and with only limited sanctions proposed by Bishop McKiernan, Smyth was allowed to continue to offend. The recent Ryan and Murphy Reports on the Catholic Church have had an extremely damaging effect on the institution here. The moral authority of the Church has been eroded to an enormous degree by the litany of scandals and the culture of secrecy, cover-up and inaction perpetrated at the highest levels within the hierarchy. There was a hope that, maybe, these reports would be a watershed, that radical action would be taken by the Church to reform itself, to give people confidence that it is capable of changing. The evidence of the past few days would appear to suggest otherwise.
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