IRELAND
The Irish Times
March 6, 2018
Soca group wants to know why Catholic orders have not paid out more in compensation
Survivors of sexual and physical abuse in schools run by the Catholic Church in Ireland have demanded a meeting with Pope Francis to discuss compensation during his visit to the island in the summer.
The Irish Catholic Church has invited the pontiff to a religious conference in August. It will be the first papal visit to Ireland since John Paul II’s tour in 1979.
The Guardian has seen a letter from the Irish Survivors of Child Abuse (Soca), in which the campaign group calls for a meeting with Pope Francis during the visit to ask why Catholic religious orders have not paid out more in compensation to abuse victims.
The group sent the letter to Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin and asked him to pass on their request to the Vatican.
Soca is angry about a deal between the Catholic Church and the then Irish government in 2002 that resulted in the taxpayer footing most of the bill for compensating those abused in religious institutions.
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