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Kilbarry1

Listed below are comments made by Kilbarry1 between Wednesday, 31st December 2008 and Thursday, 8th October 2009.

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The Vatican hits back 00:23am on 08 Oct 2009 romejellybean
I don't see any logical structure to your argument. There is no logic in the ASSUMPTION that there are hundreds or thousands of victims who never declared themselves.

My own argument is
1. The leaders of several "victims" organisations have made allegations of child killing that are obviously false and have finally been discarded (after several years)
2. The members of those organisatons did not even object - still less get rid of these leaders and spokespersons.
3. The logical conclusion is that the majority of the members have no objection to false allegations because they are making similar (i.e. false) claims themselves. The minority of truth-tellers is too small to have any influence.

If this seems callous then take a look at UK historian Richard Webster's essay "The Christmas Spirit in Ireland" regarding the almost 15,000 applications to the Residential Institutions Redress Board:

http://www.richardwebster.net/irelandsfolly.html
"Unless Ireland proves to be a country whose citizens are entirely immune to the laws of human nature, it is almost certainly the case that a significant number of those now claiming money from the government are quite genuine victims of abuse who suffered in the manner they have claimed.

"But it is also likely to be the case that a very large number of the claims received, perhaps as many as 90%, would prove, if it were possible to investigate them fully, entirely false."

I think that Richard Webster is an atheist. However he has noted the similarity between Ireland's anti-clerical Witch-hunt and the hysteria directed at (mainly lay) childcare workers in the UK. (In fact Ireland's child-killing hysteria may have been the Celtic Tiger's response to Satanic Ritual Abuse and Recovered Memory in the UK!).
The Vatican hits back 9:13pm on 07 Oct 2009 gveale "Jenkins work only applies to the USA ...Ireland may be a different story"

I don't know if a comparable study has been done in Ireland but I offer the following observations:

In Ireland between 1996 and 2004 we had a large number of allegations that children had been killed in industrial schools run by the Christian Brothers and the Sisters of Mercy. These included accusations in a major Sunday Newspaper of mass killing ('a Holocaust') at Letterfrack in Co. Galway. Not a single claim has proved to be correct. This is not surprising as several relate to periods when NO child died of ANY cause. (I coined the phrases 'Murder of the Undead' or "Victimless Murder" allegations to describe the latter - try Googling these).

One body was exhumed and proved to be a death from natural causes but the resulting publicity resulted in dozens of child abuse claims within a couple of weeks against the institution.

The child killing allegations were not made by isolated nutcases but by major newspapers including the Religious Affairs correspondent of our "newspaper of record" The Irish Times. They were also made by leading members of child abuse organisations. They have now ceased but the people responsible have not been called to account - either journalists or leaders of "Victims" organisations. The reason why the LATTER have not been dismissed is presumably because they represent the views of their members who have no objections to false allegations.

The logical conclusion is that most allegations of child abuse directed at the Catholic Church are false.
The Vatican hits back 12:30pm on 07 Oct 2009 Correction - I think that JoAnn Wypijewski's article of September 2003 is commenting on Jenkins book 'The New Anti-Catholicism: The Last Acceptable Prejudice' published in that year. ('Paedophiles and Priests' was published in 1996). There is a Wikipedia article on 'The New Anti-Catholicism' and I quote:

"Jenkins describes how bigotry and hatred toward Catholics, for a time considered a thing of the past, is still thriving in the U.S. Jenkins observes that it is a form of bigotry that is ignored or even accepted or encouraged in quarters (mainly politically and culturally liberal ones) that would not tolerate most other forms of bigotry.

A statement that is seen as racist, misogynistic, anti-Semitic, or homophobic can haunt a speaker for years, writes Jenkins, but it is still possible to make hostile and vituperative public statements about Roman Catholicism without fear of serious repercussions."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Anti-Catholicism:_The_Last_Acceptable_Prejudice
The Vatican hits back 04:45am on 07 Oct 2009 The following is from an article in 'The Nation' magazine on 22 September 2003. The author JoAnn Wypijewski is a former senior editor at the magazine which is the American equivalent of 'The New Statesman' i.e. progressive, feminist, liberal, pro-gay etc. Ms. Wypijewski is referring to Philip Jenkins book 'Paedophiles and Priests' and The article is entitled 'Liberal Pieties'.
"Jenkins offers no brief for the church's sexual agenda or its errant priests, but he rightly suspects games of "gotcha." He notes that the soundest study of priestly sexual misconduct--involving 2,252 priests over forty years--indicates that 1.7 percent behaved badly, such behaviour ranging from inappropriate speech to rape, and in only one case involving a true paedophile: i.e., an adult sexually interested in prepubescent children. Obviously, some 1,500 priests accused of any sexual abuse between the 1960s and 2002 indicates trouble, but Jenkins argues that honesty demands a recognition that (a) incidents of paedophilia are rare, (b) priests hold no monopoly on such behaviour and (c) "there is strikingly little evidence that clergy of any kind are any more or less likely to abuse than non-clerical groups who have close contact with children." A 1998 study by Education Week, for instance, cited 244 incidents of teacher-student sex over a six-month period, ranging from unwelcome touching to consensual relations to serial rape, an average of nine cases a week. THE PRESS HAS NOT ELEVATED THIS TO "SOCIAL PROBLEM" STATUS." (my emphasis)
http://www.paxmontani.org/php/HTML/nation-article.htm
Catholic diocese's response to child abuse was "too little, too late" 00:08am on 04 Jan 2009 SmasherLagru - Yes I suspect that the problem is the Guidelines themselves. The current hysteria about child abuse has led to the establishment of absurd rules, that if taken literally, make it impossible for anyone to have a private conversation about abuse with any authority figure.

Regarding Hysteria: Since 1994, EIGHT Irish Bishops, including three Archbishops, have been the target of obscene sexual slanders in the media. Bishop Magee was the target on AT LEAST one occasion - In 1999 TV3 had to broadcast an apology for slandering him. However the first slander in 1994 may well have been aimed at Magee as well. The UK Guardian was forced to apologise for publishing lies about an un-named Irish Bishop. They thought they could get away with it by not publishing his name but they gave certain details that greatly reduced the number of possible targets - and so left themselves open to a class libel suit from the Bishops. The details given fit Bishop Magee!

The other Bishops are either deceased or retired. Thus Magee is the only serving Bishop to have been subjected to sexual slanders - and he was probably targetted twice! That could well explain why he did not adhere strictly to unreasonable Guidelines about child abuse!
Catholic diocese's response to child abuse was "too little, too late" 8:17pm on 03 Jan 2009 I'm not a legal expert either but my understanding is that if a manager makes a false and RECKLESS allegation to the police he can be sued for defamation by the person he has accused. (Of course if he makes a false and MALICIOUS allegation he can be jailed.).

I think the proposed legal change a few years ago would have obliged the manager to report any suspicion of child abuse no matter how ill-founded AND would have made it impossible for the accused to sue. This was "Mandatory Reporting". Unless the manager was deliberately lying, he could not be taken to court.

Of course the ISPCC and "victims" groups like One in Four loved the idea. It would have enabled them to run riot. The people who did NOT love it, were the social workers and care workers who were dealing with difficult families. You can imagine the reaction of a parent who was subjected to such an allegation - especially after his solicitor told him that he had no legal avenue of redress. I think some would have found an ILLEGAL way of expressing their feelings - and be damned to the consequences.

Anyway the LEGAL change re Mandatory Reporting did not go through. I suspect that the problem with the Guidelines for protecting children is that they are are closer to Mandatory Reporting than to the existing laws regarding defamation and false reporting.
Catholic diocese's response to child abuse was "too little, too late" 10:36pm on 02 Jan 2009 "GUIDELINES" are not laws or part of the 10 Commandments. One of the Commandments is not to tell lies. However if a madman with an axe asks me where somebody lives, I do not have a religious obligation to tell him the truth.

The same applies to secular law. Some years ago there was a proposal for legislation that would compel teachers, social workers etc to immediately report any suspicion of child abuse to the Gardai. The proposal was strongly supported by the ISPCC but as strongly opposed by the two Irish associations of Social Workers and Care Workers. The difference is that the ISPCC is an ADVOCACY organisation that presses for constitutional changes to protect children etc. OTOH it is the Social and Care Workers who would be left to face the enraged parents whom they had wrongly accused of child abuse. The proposed legal change did NOT go ahead. So those who work with children are left with a certain amount of discretion under the law.

Bishop Magee was approached by one of his own priests who alleged that he had been abused as a youth by another priest in the Cloyne diocese. He said that he did not want the police informed. I think that it was a perfectly reasonable decision for the Bishop to agree to the man's request. After all if he had not agreed then he would have been told nothing. The reason why mandatory reporting has not been made part of the LAW, is to allow for the exercise of common sence.
Catholic diocese's response to child abuse was "too little, too late" 11:26am on 01 Jan 2009 Peter Morrow is probably right - and this demonstrates the extent of the hysteria about child abuse. Actually it goes even furher than that. A CHILD would find it very difficult to speak privately to an adult anyway because every teacher, doctor etc has to have another person present to protect themselves from a false allegation. (And do you suppose the child can't figure out why the observer is there?)

Children tend to cling to their families - even to wildly disfunctional ones. However a young person who is being abused at home MAY bring himself to the point where he will speak privately to a favourite teacher. Current regulations governing teachers (and everyone else) dictate that he will be unable to do so. Nobody benefits from this hysteria - except paedophiles.

What seems to have happened in Cloyne is that the Bishop agreed tp listen to ADULT complainants who told him that they did not want the police informed. One of the complainants was himself a priest who said he had been abused in his youth by another priest. The Bishop agreed to talk to them. If he had refused to listen AND they were serious about not going to the police, then no-one would have heard anything. In what way would this have been an improvement?
Catholic diocese's response to child abuse was "too little, too late" 00:12am on 31 Dec 2008 Is anyone here aware that the Director of Public Prosecutions has stated that no action is to be taken regarding the allegations against the two priests? OR that the local Garda (police) Superintendent has stated that there are NO current investigations under way into alleged abuse by clerics in the Diocese of Cloyne?

Reporting that the Bishop has said that the allegations are "not proven" is hardly adaquate.

Bishop Magee is being demonised because he did not inform the police of alleged abuse even though the complainants said they did not want the police involved. If a person cannot have a private conversation with a Bishop (or Teacher, Doctor or Social Worker) without the latter making a beeline for the police station, why would they tell him anything in the first place? If that is what the Guidelines say, then they are useless.

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