Bishop Questions Royal Commion's Focus on Church

By Ian Kirkwood
Newcastle Herald
September 2, 2016

http://www.theherald.com.au/story/4138370/bishop-wright-questions-royal-commissions-focus-on-the-past/

THE Catholic Bishop of Maitland-Newcastle has questioned why the Royal Commission is spending so much time on matters that happened decades ago when there was an “awful lot of stuff going on” now in broader society.

Bishop Bill Wright made the statement in the closing seconds of the pre-lunch session of the commission, after its chairman, Justice Peter McClellan, asked his response to the fact that 40 per cent of the abuse revealed to the commission in private sessions happened in Catholic institutions.

Justice McClellan said that despite this level of abuse, there were still people in the church who did not believe the spotlight should have been shone on the church as it has.

Bishop Wright said he himself wondered why so many of the case studies were “delving into matters of 30 or 40 years ago and I kind of wonder where the more contemporary spotlight should be fuelling”.

He said he knew it was the remit of of the commission to look at institutional responses but “I have this misgiving that there’s an awful lot of stuff going on out there now and we spend so much time on matters that happened decades ago”.

Justice McClellan said: “Thank you for that, but we have been charged with, and the community wanted the church, your church, amongst others, to face up to what happened in the past in a public way.”

Bishop Wright said he hoped he hadn’t come across as saying the commission was “an exercise that should not have been performed” but he had a concern “as to where the balance falls not so much between Catholics and others as between past and present”.

Bishop Wright began his evidence after the morning break with an unreserved apology to all hurt by the church. While the focus of this hearing was on Vince Ryan, the bishop said his apology was to all, regardless of the perpetrator.

“Finally, as bishop I humbly offer an unreserved apology on behalf of the diocese to all those men who have suffered and continue to suffer as a consequence of Ryan’s abuse and of the actions and omissions of members of this diocese,” the bishop said.

Questioned by counsel assisting the commission, Stephen Free, he said he had little to do with the diocese before his arrival to replace Michael Malone in 2011.

Bishop Michael Malone had made a similar observation on Thursday about his lack of familiarity with the region when he succeeded Leo Clarke in 1995.

He agreed with Mr Free that he knew he was coming to a diocese with a troubled past about child sexual abuse.

He said he remembered talking with Malone about Vince Ryan when he first arrived, but the discussion was not more than about any other matters.

“The church is an enduring institution so its present leadership must answer for past matters that were done by us,” Bishop Wright said.

Asked about the detail of examination of past events, he said: “We are subjecting some of these questions to very close examination here and I am prepared to accept the general picture of what they did without satisfying myself on every detail.”

Asked about how much Monsignor Patrick Cotter knew about Ryan, the bishop was taken to a 1997 statement to the Catholic Church’s insurers by Cotter about a 1975 matter in which he said he was confident that no-one ever complained to him about Ryan.

Earlier this week, the commission heard that a mother had spoken to Cotter in 1974 about Ryan touching her son “on his private parts”.

Bishop Wright agreed it appeared that Cotter had been told in 1974.

Asked if Cotter could have forgotten about it, the bishop said it was “unlikely” that he would have forgotten.

He said he was unsure about the relationship between Cotter and Ryan but it was possible that Cotter knew about Ryan without ever having spoken with him about.

Mr Free said the 1997 statement referred to adult homosexuality but given what Cotter had been told by Sister Evelyn Woodward had told him in 1975 he could not have been under any illusions that it was not abuse of children.

The chairman of the commission, Justice Peter McClellan, then questioned the bishop about how the church could regard the anal penetration of boys as a moral issue rather than a criminal issue, as had been heard on Thursday.

Bishop Wright said that when he was ordained in 1975 he had no awareness of abuse by priests of children, unless “the Canadian stuff” had happened by then, which he was not sure of.

Justice McClellan said the evidence showed that even at the highest level of criminal acts in abusing children, it didn’t occur to those in charge that they had a criminal in its midst.

He said the church’s acts could possibly lead to a conclusion that it did not understand how society “actually worked”. It also led to asking whether the church was capable of responding to criminality within its own ranks.

Returning to Cotter’s 1997 statement to the insurers, Bishop Wright said it seemed Cotter didn’t have “the mental framework . . . to see it [Ryan’s actions] as [anything] other than a manifestation of homosexuality”.

Turning to a 1996 statement Cotter gave to then police constable Troy Grant – now the NSW deputy premier – Bishop Wright agreed that the police were questioning Cotter about whether he concealed Ryan’s behaviour, as well as Ryan himself.

Mr Free said Cotter was telling the police he knew nothing more than rumour about Ryan, and Bishop Wright agreed that “could not be true”.

Mr Free said that while there was a question in these matters of judging historical matters by modern standards but that was a different thing to answering honestly when asked by the police.

“The possibility there is that he has aged and forgotten but it looks on the face of it untrue and likely dishonest,” Bishop Wright said.

He said Cotter was either “incompetent or stupid” if he believed that Ryan would have come back cured after his treatment in Melbourne simply because – as Mr Free said – no-one had told him anything “to the contrary”.

Bishop Wright said that while there was a suggestion that Ryan had some restrictions on him when he returned from Melbourne, there was nothing that restricted his access to children, as the commission heard when he was giving mass at a high school soon after his return.

He agreed the parishioners were never told anything about Ryan having been treated in Melbourne.

Mr Free then turned again to Bishop Clarke’s knowledge, and his claims to have said that 1995 was “the first time I was told the details.”.

Bishop Wright said there were lots of reasons a priest could be sent to Melbourne to the National Pastoral Institute but Justice McClellan pointed out that the document they were looking at referred to “a complaint”.

Bishop Wright agreed.

Bishop Clarke had written: “I have not received any accusations that could be investigated”, which Justice McClellan said “rather suggests that he did know what was going on”.

Bishop Wright agreed that Cotter had said in some documents that he had told Bishop Clarke in 1976 that Ryan was being treated for “problems with children”, while on other occasions, including in interviews with police, he had been “less forthcoming” about Ryan.

Taken to a letter written by Father Maurice Cahill, a Maitland priest in the 1970s, Bishop Wright agreed that Monsignor Cotter had been “effectively the fall guy” for the church’s failings over Ryan and that Bishop Clarke had – in Mr Free’s words – “let off the hook in circumstances when he had in fact known more than he let on”.

Mr Free took Bishop Ryan to his statement to the commission where he said he was in two minds as to whether Ryan should be laicised. The commission heard on Thursday that Bishop Malone had decided against this course because it would enable the church to keep some hold on Ryan.

Bishop Wright said Ryan had signed a memorandum of understanding with the church saying he had co-operated and confessed to all of his offences but this was now “clearly not the case”.