Fr Joe Borg
Thank God for Mgr Martin
What a year-end for the Church in Ireland! Four bishops resigned within the space of six days. Incredible, but true.
On Christmas Eve, Dublin Auxiliary Bishops Eamonn Walsh and Raymond Field announced they were offering their resignations to the Pope. The previous day, Bishop James Moriarty of Kildare and Leighlin announced his resignation. Bishop Donal Murray of Limerick was the first to go on December 17.
These resignations came in the wake of the publication on November 26 of the Murphy Commission Report which investigated the handling of some 325 abuse claims in the archdiocese of Dublin during the years 1975-2004. The commission in charge of the investigation found that Church leaders had put the avoidance of scandal and the institution's reputation before the rights of victims.
The Murphy Commission accused none of these bishops of committing any child abuse. They were criticised for lack of thorough investigations or of not taking action that was effective enough and, as a result, children were put at risk and abused. When the report was published, these four bishops were adamant that there was no reason for them to resign. They needed more than a little prodding to go.
One of those who did the prodding was the Archbishop of Dublin, Mgr Diarmuid Martin. Before becoming archbishop, he was, among other things, the secretary of the Pontifical Council for Jus-tice and Peace, and the Per-manent Observer of the Holy See in Geneva, at the United Nations Office and specialised agencies, and at the World Trade Organisation. He was appointed Archbishop of Dublin in 2004.
Mgr Martin's zero tolerance to child abuse was clear from the very beginning of his ministry in Dublin.
His stand earned him criticism by others in the Church, and even public sparring with his predecessor, Cardinal Desmond Connell. When in January 2008, Mgr Martin provided the Murphy Commission with documents relating to claims of child abuse against a representative sample of 46 priests, Mgr Connell threatened legal action to prevent the commission from examining the documents.
The cardinal eventually withdrew his request for the injunction. The move was welcomed by Mgr Martin, who assured victims of abuse as well as priests, of his continued commitment to seeking the truth about the past.
When the Murphy Comm-ission report was published, Mgr Martin said that when he read it he was overcome with anger and disgust, and at one point while reading it, hurled it across the room. In a strongly-worded column published in the Irish Times, he wrote: "The first thing the Church has to do is to move out of any mode of denial. That was the position for far too long and it is still there."
Mgr Martin also encouraged the bishops who were criticised by the Murphy Commission to reconsider their current situations - a statement that was generally interpreted as a veiled invitation for them to resign. He was involved in a public dispute with at least one of the bishops mentioned in the report. Persistent media reports said Mgr Martin was ready to ask the Congregation of Bishops to remove the bishops implicated in the report if they do not resign of their own accord.
Mgr Martin's actions and the resultant resignations are a clear sign that the Church in Ireland is ready to face the demons of its abusive past and is set on the path of zero tolerance towards abuse.
Our bishops, like Mgr Martin, have a similar attitude. Unfortunately, both in Ireland and in Malta, some others of lesser stature are still tied to the old ways of omertà where the institution is prized more than innocent victims.
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Joe Xuereb
Jan 4th 2010, 23:40
@ Raymond Sammut. Joe Borg is not of the 'some others of lesser stature are still tied' ilk so what would you expect? What else would you expect from someone who declared: http://www.timesofmalta.com/blogs/view/20090509/fr-joe-borg/should-there-be-more-mosques-in-malta
Nothing, but nothing, surprises me.
Raymond Sammut
Jan 4th 2010, 06:08
@ Fr J Borg -- "If you follow what I write..." My previous comment on this board is constructed within the content of this article you have authored, and I feel it is perfectly in order. This is because this article makes no reference to any of your previous articles on the subject, and it clearly attributes the resignations to the Murphy report.
The Murphy investigations did not commence until 2006, and they were initiated only after public revelations on the Irish media in 2002. By then the Ryan investigations had already been well underway because these had started back in 1999. We therefore have the Irish media and the Irish government to thank. Mgr Martin only comes on the scene much later and cannot be given any credit. Both his "prodding" and the "resignations" were largely irrelevant once the conclusions in the Ryan report had been made public some four months earlier. In fact, in my view, Mgr Martin's role amounts to mere (if not equivocal) apology and certainly not accountability on the part of the Church in Ireland. For example, what reasons were given for the resignations? Say "health" reasons. We wouldn't consider this as accountability.
Fr J Borg
Jan 3rd 2010, 19:33
@ Raymond Sammut. If you follow what I write you would know that I commented on the conclusions of the Ryan Report.
Raymond Sammut
Jan 3rd 2010, 15:43
❝What a year-end for the Church in Ireland! Four bishops resigned within the space of six days. Incredible, but true.❞ Why is it incredible, Fr Borg?
This gang of four resigned only because it was made clear that the alternative was expulsion. This was systematic concealment at the highest level in the Church in Ireland spanning at least thirty years.
What I find incredible is the fact that Fr Borg did not mention in his article that the publication of the Murphy Commission Report in November 2009 was preceded by the publication of the Ryan Report in May 2009. The latter consisted of an investigation under the auspices of the Irish government that lasted 10 years. It arrived at a number of conclusions. For example:
"Perpetrators of abuse were able to operate undetected for long periods at the core of institutions. When confronted with evidence of sexual abuse, the response of the religious authorities was to transfer the offender to another location where, in many instances, he was free to abuse again."(Wiki)
Fr Borg clearly gives credit to Mgr Martin, but the truth is that the initiative for accountability came from the Irish government alone.
louise vella
Jan 3rd 2010, 10:10
Fr Borg entitled his article “Thank God for Mgr Martin” and concluded that “our bishops, like Mgr Martin, have a similar attitude.”
I agree that the Irish people should thank God for Mgr Martin, but I disagree that Mgr Cremona has a similar attitude. Our Archbishop has not yet found the courage to do what Mgr Martin did. No doubt he believes in zero tolerance on child abuse by priests, but he has not done anything about it. All documents relating to child abuse by Maltese priests are kept in the most secret (but not always sacred) archives of the Maltese Curia.
Like Mgr Martin, Mgr Cremona should immediately provide the Maltese public with the list of priest child molesters defrocked by the Vatican. By so doing he would inform parents about priests who are a danger to our children. Then we shall be in a position to say “Thank God for Mgr Cremona for having a similar attitude to Mgr Martin”. Until then we can only agree with Fr Borg that some “of lesser stature are still tied to the old ways of omertà where the institution is prized more than innocent victims”.