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1. If it was happening in Ireland, we can be sure it was happening here in Australia and many of the bishops still living would have been up to their eyeballs in the coverups. It's part of the Vatican style, after all.
   

   Posted By: Richard Flynn

2. It's called burying your head in the sand and hoping the problem will go away.
   It also shows the lack of compassion to the person in the street.
   For some reason the church for so long has felt it was superior to most people and enjoyed laying down the law to parishioners no matter what the issue was.
   The Irish church has always punished the fallen - be it single girls, separated wives and husbands etc now they have their own big probem and won't acknowledge it.

   Posted By: Jim

3. So Pope Benedict XVI says wayward priests should be brought to justice. What about the wayward bishops who covered up and, therefor, assisted the abusers? The Vatican form of punishment for these bishops: jobs in Rome of course!

   Posted By: Cobber

4. Old News, same tragedy, still no real action other than scapegoating and more cover ups.

   Posted By: TJ Lawson

5. The 'covering' up, by those who didn't abuse children themselves, is the real elephant in the Church's room of the abuse scandal.
   The thinking process behind someone's decision that despite extreme harm done to children, it was not the central issue.
   Rather, it was seen that an offending cleric's Church role , gave him some magical rights over & above a normal adult's responsibility to protect children.
   Frankly, the covering up was equally as pathological as the committing of the offences. Same processes involved....lack of empathy & normal adult responsibity .
   

   Posted By: Marie H

6. As a traditional Catholic with a great love of my religion, I am absolutely horrified and disgusted by this report. Reading Irish press reports and listening to Irish radio on-line the information and details being released is almost unbelievable. It will do a huge amount of damage to the Catholic faith both in Ireland and around the world. Together with the Ryan report the history of abuse extends back almost as far as the foundation of the Irish Free State. It very much brings to mind what Our Blessed Lady announced at Garabandel. "Many Cardinals,Bishops and Priests are leading the Faithful to Perdition." The clergy involved in this scandal are traitors to the Catholic religion.They will have to answer to God Almighty. So will the civil authorities and others who knew of this abuse and remained silent.

   Posted By: John Tobin

7. The Catholic Church has always taught (even in 1975) that there are four ways we can sin:
   1) By sharing in the sin directly and voluntarily
   2) By ordering, advising, praising or approving them
   3)By not disclosing or hindering sinners when we are obliged to do so
   4) By protecting evil doers.
   If the shoe fits.

   Posted By: anne

8. So what now will happen to the guilty who showed no compassion to the children?
   Surely it is time that the Church ended the man-made rules for the cruel celibacy rules for priests which must be a very high contributing factor to this state of affairs

   Posted By: Anne Rider

9. As a member of the Catholic Church, I feel deep shame when reading about betrayal of the innocent while at the same time preaching God is love, celebrating Mass, etc. Greater shame though in that there was a cover-up. The perpetrators of such disgraceful treatment of children should be brought to justice and so should any higher authorities, church and state who covered it up. I also feel sympathy for the really wonderful priests and bishops who bear the shame heavily when they are completey innocent and give their lives to shepherd in the way Jesus intended, not only in Ireland but all over the world. I don't question the presence of God in our world but I am questioning the relevance of Catholic Church when these crimes have been committed so recently. And how many others have we not heard about? How much closer to home? May those betrayed find healing.

   Posted By: Kathy

10. If there is enough evidence, then those archbishops should be put on trial, as should any australian clergy guilty of aiding and abetting criminals.
    Anne: The hundreds of thousands (millions?) of child molesters outside the catholic church are under no vow of celibacy, are they?
    Furthermore, this website
    http://brokenrites.alphalink.com.au/nletter/bccrime.html
    will show you that, in Australia at least, more than four times more boys have been attacked than girls. Ending celibacy won't end homosexual urges. It also won't stop married men attacking young girls, will it?
    
    

    Posted By: Paul Keen

11. Can anybody name one institution (religious, secular, government, corporate or private) which did not obsessively hide child abuse up until the 1990s?
    Of course we should expect the Church to meet higher standards than any man-made institution. But the government/media near-total focus on the Church alone as regards this crime, gives the public the totally false impression that this crime is or was more prevalent in the Church than elsewhere.
    The Church is made up of sinful people, including its leaders on earth, who scandalise us by their sins. That is a natural consequence of the scandal of the Incarnation - the eternal omniscient all-good, all-loving God becoming a material Man. He and the Church He founded are both in the world, but not of this world.

    Posted By: Peter G

12. Anne Rider: If celibacy were the cause, why do we see identical rates of abuse among married Anglican ministers, Evangelical pastors and Orthodox Jewish rabbis? Not only this, it seems we read at least twice a week news of a married state school teacher arrested for child molestation.
    Celibacy has absolutely nothing to do with it. My theory, which is shared by others, is the influence of Jansenist heresy among Irish Catholics. If you're interested in theology and praxis, I'd suggest you start looking there.

    Posted By: Aquino

13. For those truly interested in keeping up with the coverage of the Scandal in the Dublin Archdiocese the best source is: www.bishopsaccountability.org/abusetracker
    
    The stories of coverups are the same, all over the world. How is this possible? Back around 1963 the Vatican issued a directive called, "Crimen Solicitationes," which instructed all bishops, cardinals, etc... on how to handle stories of Priest/Nun Pedophilia along with clearly orchestrated coverups. For the complete Vatican directive "Crimen Solicitationes," put the above quote in a Search Engine.

    Posted By: Jeannie

14. I wonder how the people who are critical of the Church's behavior on this terrible state of affairs will be classed: as Orthodox Catholics or Dissenters?

    Posted By: Chris

15. Chris: Interesting rhetorical question. Of course, we both know that this scandal has nothing to do with theology, and everything to do with human weakness and evil. Whoever is critical of individual church members (the church itself is wholly innocent in all of this, despite what some might say) who have broken the law perfectly correct in their desire for justice and cleansing, no matter how far they may be from the overall Truth of Christ.

    Posted By: Paul Keen

16. For the best informed and balanced article on Crimen Sollicitationis, see John Allen's article in the NCR: http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/update/bn080703.htm A few points need to be noted:
    1) What is covered is not pedophilia, but homosexual acts by clergy, and related abuse of the confessional.
    2) "That Crimen Sollicitationis was not designed to 'cover up' sex abuse, canonists say, is clear in paragraph 15, which obligates anyone with knowledge of a priest abusing the confessional for that purpose to come forward, under pain of excommunication for failing to do so. This penalty is stipulated "lest [the offense] remain occult and unpunished and always with inestimable detriment to souls."
    3) “Secrecy in canonical cases serves three purposes. First, it is designed to allow witnesses and other parties to speak freely, knowing that their responses will be confidential. Second, it allows the accused party to protect his good name until guilt is established. Third, it allows victims to come forward without exposing themselves to publicity. The high degree of secrecy in Crimen Sollicitationis was also related to the fact that it dealt with the confessional.”
    4) “Crimen Sollicitationis dealt with canonical cases against a priest that could lead to removal from ministry or expulsion from the priesthood. Its imposition of secrecy thus concerned the church's internal disciplinary process. It did not, according to canonical experts, prevent a bishop or anyone else from reporting a crime against a minor to the civil authorities.”
    5) And most importantly, very few Bishops would have known about it.

    Posted By: Adeodatus

17. Needless to say, the above notwithstanding, what happened in Dublin and elsewhere is horrific, and the more horrible for involving the abuse of trust by the shepherds of the Church.

    Posted By: Adeodatus

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