IRELAND
Irish Times
When abuse victim Marie Collins claims the Roman Curia is frustrating efforts to implement decisions which will make the church a safer place for children, we must take notice
A feature of the clerical child abuse scandals that emerged in Ireland over recent decades has been the central role women played in bringing them to light. As pertinent has been the male-determined legalistic mindset they’ve had to deal with in response. The latter has consistently favoured structure over the suffering of children and its prevention.
Next Monday will mark the 20th anniversary of the broadcasting by RTÉ of Dear Daughter, the documentary wherein the late Christine Buckley and other women detailed their experiences as children in Dublin’s Goldenbridge orphanage. What was intended as a feel-good story of orphan girl meeting long-lost father became something more explosive at the insistence of Ms Buckley; then also lobbying politicians to help all who had been in such institutions as children.
Then too the late Mary Raftery, with Sheila Ahern, was at work on her ground-breaking States of Fear series which recounted the horrors of what had been going on in those same residential institutions for children. In 2002 her Cardinal Secrets programme exposed the handling of clerical child sex abuse allegations in Dublin’s Catholic archdiocese.
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