Irelands 30,000 Stolen Childhoods...

[J.R.E.]

This article appeared on the front page of this mornings, St. Petersburg Times :


Irish school victims angry that abusers not named.

By SHAWN POGATCHNIK
Associated Press Writer


http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_IRELAND_CATHOLIC_ABUSE?SITE=FLPET&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2009-05-20-13-19-17
 


  
Thousands Beaten, Raped in Irish Reform Schools
 
  
Latest News
Irish school victims angry that abusers not named

 

 
DUBLIN (AP) -- The thousands of victims of Ireland's child-abuse homes spent decades just trying to get the public to believe them. But even after a mammoth investigation proved the horrors of their youth, many say they are no nearer to real justice.

A nine-year probe into child abuse by Ireland's Catholic religious orders painted a damning portrait of a system that shielded child-molesters from justice and trapped generations of Ireland's poorest children to misery from the 1930s to the 1990s.

Irish President Mary McAleese on Thursday denounced what she called an "atrocious betrayal of love" by Catholic clergy toward these children. She praised the victims for demanding the truth, despite Irish Catholic society's desire to doubt them and look the other way.

"My heart goes out to the victims of this terrible injustice, an injustice compounded by the fact that they had to suffer in silence for so long," McAleese said. "This report utterly vindicates their determination to break that silence."

But the victims, now mostly in their 50s to 80s, said Wednesday's 2,600-page report, despite its unprecedented scope and detail, did not make public what matters most - the names of their abusers.

That's because a religious order at the heart of the abuse charges - the Christian Brothers - successfully sued the investigators to keep the identities of all their abusive members secret.

"I do genuinely believe that it would have been a further step towards our healing if our abusers had been named and shamed," said Christine Buckley, 62, who spent her first 18 years in a Dublin orphanage run by Sisters of Mercy nuns.

Buckley, the daughter of an unwed mother, said the orphanage was closed to the outside world and the children inside lived a life of slave labor manufacturing rosaries. She said there was no way to escape the ritual humiliation, beatings and rape regardless of whether the children achieved their quota of producing 60 rosaries per day.

She didn't track down her parents, an Irish mother and Nigerian father, until her 40s, when she became one of the first to demand justice for her stolen youth.

"I didn't have a childhood," said Buckley, who recalled being constantly cold, hungry and thirsty as the nuns denied children water to keep them from wetting their beds. She was severely beaten by a nun for trying to smuggle out a letter detailing the abuse, she said - which included being forced to have a "date" with a pedophile on the staff.

The Catholic religious orders that ran 52 workhouse-style reform schools from the late 19th century until the mid-1990s apologized after the report's release, speaking of their shame and regret. Abuses also took place at 216 other church-run institutions for children, which included orphanages, hostels, regular schools and schools for the disabled.

The report - even in a country hardened by 15 years of revelations about sex-predator priests - has shocked and sickened the nation.

But the Christian Brothers indicated they would continue to protect the identities of rank-and-file brothers accused of abuse - men who were never reported to police, and instead were allowed to change jobs and keep harming children.

The Christian Brothers' leader in Ireland, Brother Kevin Mullan, said the organization had been right to keep names of even the most well-documented abusers out of Wednesday's report because "perhaps we had doubts about some of the allegations."

"But on the other hand, I'd have to say that at this stage, we have no interest in protecting people who were perpetrators of abuse," Mullan said, vowing to cooperate fully with any further investigation.

Buckley said the religious orders for years branded victims as money-seeking liars - and were incapable of admitting their guilt today. She specifically criticized Mullan.

"(Now) he doesn't mind if the abusers are named and shamed? Isn't that a little bit late for us?" she said.

Other victims emphasized that, for some of their former schoolmates, the end came far too soon. Their graves are inside the grounds of the workhouses, where some died of disease and malnutrition - and, survivors suspect, from the violence of their carekeepers.

"There's a lot of people who didn't survive here, and a lot of people who left very damaged," said Mannix Flynn, who spent two years at a Christian Brothers school in remote western Ireland.

Flynn this week revisited the closed school grounds, where dozens of residents and staff are buried, their plots marked with small heart-shaped headstones.

"The whole place was a place of abuse. There wasn't any sanctuary here. It was constant trauma and constant fear of attack," said Flynn, 52, a playwright, author and artist in Dublin. He said he and his friends faced chronic sexual assaults.

The Irish government, which in 1999 apologized for its role in permitting decades of abuse and established the commission to nail down the full truth of the matter, has tried to make some amends.

A government-appointed panel has paid 12,000 abuse survivors an average of euro65,000 ($90,000) each - on condition they surrender their right to sue either the church or the state. About 2,000 more claims are pending.

Irish Catholic leaders cut a controversial deal with the government in 2001 that capped the church's contribution at euro128 million ($175 million) - a small fraction of the final cost to taxpayers.

Some victims and opposition politicians called Thursday for the church to give much more.

Cardinal Sean Brady, leader of Ireland's 4 million Catholics, said the church's key responsibility now was to "make the church a safe place for children." But he said increasing the church's financial contributions for compensation was a decision that specific orders had to make, not the Irish church as a whole.

[mecch]

This story is ghastly. Horrendous. It's like the middle ages.  And then the NYTimes had an article today about war and rape
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/21/opinion/21kristof.html
Where Kristof interviews child victims of rape.

In both stories grown men are doing this and there is no accountability.

Humanity can be so perverse - how people can be so evil in modern times, boggles the mind.

[BT65]

Probably one of the reasons, why my father's father, who was from Ireland, was a Orangeman.

[fearless]

It's disgusting, but the thing that really riles me is the lack of any real contrition by these organisations. They continue to protect the guilty and cast doubt on the victims stories.

IMO these organisations should be made illegal and disbanded and those found guilty thrown in gaol where they will get a bit of their own medicine. At the time of the events they protected the guilty and covered up the whole sorry saga. They have continued to protect the guilty and despite their 'regrets and sorrow' continue to stand in the way of justice.

Imagine the outrage and action if it was a non-religious group that was running any of these institutions. Imagine if it was a group of gay men, or women, or just about anyone else.

In disgust. LS

[Ann]

Probably one of the reasons, why my father's father, who was from Ireland, was a Orangeman.

Well, no, actually. Being an Orangeman is a matter of upbringing, not reaction. Back when he was an Orangeman, the fact that these kinds of despicable acts were being committed by the Church was very much hidden and not talked about. It was "unthinkable" that the Church would have a hand in this kind of stuff and that's part of the reason it went on for so long (and continues...) - the children who had the courage to speak up simply weren't believed.

A very sad state of affairs. Sickening. It's one of those things in life that I just "don't get" on any level.

By the way, has anyone here read "Angela's Ashes"?

Ann

[BT65]

Ann, I suppose you're right.  When he (father's father) came to America, he ended up marrying a Catholic woman and converting. 

And no, I haven't read Angela's Ashes.  Is it about the abuse that took place?

[dixieman]

Ann, I've read "Angelas Ashes" and I've watched the movie at an alternative movie house in ?Montgomery, AL... called the Capri theater... its a heartwrenching story... its unfortunate that its true...

[edfu]

I spent six years in a Catholic seminary, and I've said it before, and I'll say it again:  The Roman Catholic Church is responsible for more human suffering and death than any other religious organization in history.   This blood cult has wallowed in two millennia of deceit, lies, fear, murder, torture, rape, and incalculable violence.  Today it condemns millions to AIDS-related deaths by forbidding the use of condoms.  A religion of so-called love vilifies the love of gay couples, fights to prevent legal gay marriage, and libels gays by calling them "intrinsically disordered."  It openly flaunts the separation of church and state by attempting to inflict its medieval "morality" on the entire U.S. population.  

Dominus vobiscum, indeed!  

[umfowabo]

I was reading an article about this in the paper yesterday.It made me feel sick how they've just got away with doing so much damage to people especially children or disabled people.Just because they're part of the Catholic church why are they immune to prosecution?I don't think our laws are written to say "but if you're a priest or a nun don't worry,this doesn't apply to you".
It's like with the MP's and their expenses it seems all they have to do is say sorry and promise not to do it again.And then it's all forgiven?But anyone else would be fired and prosecuted for fraud.
Doesn't make any sense to me at all.I just feel really sorry for all those people they hurt to have not been believed for so long.And then even when people do believe them,to just have their abusers get away with it while they have to live with the affects of it all their lives.

Matthew

[Ann]

And no, I haven't read Angela's Ashes.  Is it about the abuse that took place?

Not exactly. It's about growing up poor and Catholic in Limerick in the 30s and 40s. The Church weren't exactly kind to the family. It shows the kind of setting this stuff was happening in. It's a good read, I highly recommend it.

I've watched the movie at an alternative movie house

I wasn't aware they'd made a movie of it. I'll have to look for the DVD.

Ann

[mecch]

Re: Angela's Ashes -
A good read, witty, a nasty story, and probably mostly fiction.
The book is so damn Irish with that dark humour.
The film isn't so good, no wit, just grim.