In Ireland, beginning in the 1990s, a series of criminal cases and Irish government enquiries established that hundreds of priests had abused thousands of children over decades. Six reports by the former National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church established that six Irish priests had been convicted between 1995 and 2011. This has contributed to the secularisation of Ireland and to the decline in influence of the Catholic Church. Ireland held referendums to legalise same-sex marriage in 2015 and abortion in 2020.
Like the Catholic Church sex abuse cases in the United States and elsewhere, the abuse in Ireland included cases of high-profile, supposedly celibate Catholic clerics involved in illicit heterosexual relations as well as widespread physical abuse of children in the Catholic-run childcare network. In many cases, the abusing priests were moved to other parishes to avoid embarrassment or a scandal, assisted by senior clergy. By 2010 a number of in-depth judicial reports had been published, but with only a limited number of criminal convictions.
In March 2010, Pope Benedict XVI wrote a pastoral letter of apology for all of the abuse that had been carried out by Catholic clergy in Ireland. On 31 May 2010, Benedict established a formal panel to investigate the sex abuse scandal, saying that it could serve as a healing mechanism for the country and its Catholics. Among the nine members of the apostolic visitation were Cardinal Seán Patrick O'Malley, the Archbishop of Boston (he investigated the Archdiocese of Dublin); Cardinal Timothy Michael Dolan, the two nuns, Sister Sharon Holland (IHM) and Sister Mairin McDonagh (RJM),(who investigated women's religious institutes and the formation there), Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, the Archbishop Emeritus of Westminster.
In August 2018, a list was published revealing that over 1,300 Catholic clergy members in Ireland were accused of sexual abuse and 82 of them were convicted.
Early revelations of sexual misconduct
The accepted norm in the Irish Church was that its priesthood was celibate and chaste. Homosexuality was and in some places of Ireland still is, viewed as both a sin and a crime. The Church forbade its members (the "faithful") to use artificial contraception, campaigned strongly against laws allowing abortion and divorce, and publicly disapproved of unmarried cohabiting couples and illegitimacy.
A series of television documentaries in the 1990s and 2010s, such as "Suffer the children" (UTV, 2004),MOORE, Chris, "Betrayal of Trust: The Father Brendan Smyth Affair and the Catholic Church"; Marino 1995, ; the producer's book about the programme's content Suing the Pope or The Magdalene Sisters, led on to the need for a series of government-sponsored reports and new guidelines within the Church and society to better protect children. In 1995–2002, the emergence of the same problem led to the view that the Church had attempted to cover up abuse and misconduct, which was not limited to sexual abuse (see Catholic sex abuse cases in the United States). By the late 2000s the misconduct was recognized as a worldwide scandal.
Brendan Smyth One of the most widely known cases of sexual abuse in Ireland involved Brendan Smyth, who, between 1945 and 1989, sexually abused and assaulted 20 children in parishes in Belfast, Dublin, and the United States. The investigation of the Smyth case was allegedly obstructed by the Norbertine Order. He was arrested in 1995; however, Ireland's Attorney General did not immediately comply with a request from the Royal Ulster Constabulary for Smyth's extradition. The ensuing controversy over the delay led to the collapse of the Fianna Fáil/Labour coalition government.Escholarship.bc.edu As of early May 2012 Cardinal Seán Brady was under pressure to resign because as a part of a church investigation into Smyth he only reported the information he gleaned to church authorities and not to the police. The church's subsequent failure to deal with Smyth gave him the opportunity to abuse more children. Brady only resigned when required to do so by canon law upon turning 75 in September 2014.
Abuse in the state childcare system In the 1990s, a series of television programs publicized allegations of systemic abuse in Ireland's Roman Catholic-run childcare system, primarily in the Reformatory and Industrial Schools. The abuse occurred primarily between the 1930s and 1970s. These documentaries included "Dear Daughter," "Washing Away the Stain," and "Witness: Sex in a Cold Climate and Sinners". These programs interviewed adult victims of abuse who provided testimony of their experiences, which documented Church and State collusion in the operation of these institutions, and they underscored the climate of secrecy and denial that permeated the church response when faced with controversial accusations. The topic was also covered by American broadcast media. Programs such as CBS's 60 Minutes and ABC's 20/20 produced segments on the subject for an Irish-American audience.
In 1999, a documentary film series titled States of Fear detailed abuse suffered by Irish children between the 1930s and 1970s in the state childcare system, primarily in the Reformatory and Industrial Schools.
Response of the Irish government to the scandal In response to the furor aroused by media reports, the Irish government commissioned a study that took nine years to complete. On 20 May 2009, the commission released its 2600-page report, which drew on testimony from thousands of former inmates and officials from more than 250 church-run institutions. The commission found that Catholic priests and nuns had terrorized thousands of boys and girls for decades and that government inspectors had failed to stop the chronic beatings, rapes, and humiliation. The report characterized rape and molestation as "endemic" in Irish Catholic church-run Industrial Schools and orphanages.
Response of the Church to the scandals In February 2002, 18 religious institutes agreed to provide more than €128 million in compensation to the victims of child abuse.
In 2005 the Church published an Instruction Concerning the Criteria for the Discernment of Vocations with regard to Persons with Homosexual Tendencies in view of their Admission to the Seminary and to Holy Orders.
In 2006 the Church set up the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church in Ireland (NBSC) to suggest ways to safeguard children and improve policy, and to monitor practices and observance of policy. In 2008 the Health Service Executive had required a child safety audit which the Bishops felt unable to co-operate with for legal reasons, and in 2009 they asked the NBSC to perform this role. In its report of 2010–March 2011 the NBSC complained that it had also been denied the same information, also for legal reasons, and that Church funding for its training programmes in child protection had ended in 2009. The 2010–11 report listed 272 new allegations of abuse, mainly "of a historical nature," up from 197 allegations in its 2009–10 report.
Brendan Comiskey In March 2002, a BBC documentary, titled Suing the Pope, highlighted the case of Seán Fortune, one of the most notorious clerical sex offenders. The film followed Colm O'Gorman as he investigated the story of how Fortune was allowed to abuse him and countless other teenage boys.Suing the Pope BBC News The Church's practice of parish transfers of abusive priests allowed Fortune to be transferred to other parishes without notifying them about any former abuse allegations.
On 1 April 2002, Brendan Comiskey, Bishop of Ferns, resigned over charges that he had failed to deal adequately with allegations that Fortune and others were sexually abusing children.
Desmond Connell
In October 2002, Ireland's national broadcasting station, Raidió Teilifís Éireann, or RTE, aired a television documentary titled Primetime: Cardinal Secrets which charged Dublin's Cardinal Desmond Connell with mishandling the sex abuse scandal and accused him of participating in a deliberate cover-up of facts. Connell retired as archbishop on 26 April 2004.
The Murphy Report found that Connell had handled the affair "badly" as he was "slow to recognize the seriousness of the situation". It did praise him for making the archdiocesan records available to the authorities in 2002 and for his 1995 actions in giving the authorities the names of 17 priests who had been accused of abuse, although it said the list was incomplete as complaints were made against at least 28 priests in the Archdiocese. He was criticized for being "economical with the truth" in his useMurphy Report, Page 643 of the concept of mental reservation to inadequately answer questions truthfullyCardinal Connell explained the concept of mental reservation to the Commission in the following way: "Well, the general teaching about mental reservation is that you are not permitted to tell a lie. On the other hand, you may be put in a position where you have to answer, and there may be circumstances in which you can use an ambiguous expression realising that the person who you are talking to will accept an untrue version of whatever it may be – permitting that to happen, not willing that it happened, that would be lying. It really is a matter of trying to deal with extraordinarily difficult matters that may arise in social relations where people may ask questions that you simply cannot answer. Everybody knows that this kind of thing is liable to happen. So, mental reservation is, in a sense, a way of answering without lying". about his knowledge of the abusive activities of priests under his control.
Ferns Report
The Ferns Inquiry (2005) was an official Irish government inquiry into the allegations of clerical sexual abuse in the Irish Roman Catholic Diocese of Ferns. The investigation was established in the wake of the broadcast of the BBC Television documentary "Suing the Pope". O'Gorman, through One in Four, the organisation he founded to support women and men who have experienced sexual violence, successfully campaigned for the Ferns Inquiry.
The Ferns Inquiry recorded its revulsion at the extent, severity and duration of the child sexual abuse allegedly perpetrated on children by priests acting under the aegis of the Diocese of Ferns.
Irish Child Abuse Commission 2009
A lengthy report detailing cases of emotional, physical and sexual abuse of thousands of children over 70 years was published on 20 May 2009. The report drew on the testimony of nearly 2,000 witnesses, men and women who attended more than 200 Catholic-run schools from the 1930s until the 1990s.
As per 2002 agreement between the victims on one side and the Roman Catholic brothers and Irish government on other side, all those who accepted the state/Brothers settlements had to waive their right to sue both the church and the government. Their abusers' identities are also kept secret.
Response of government Ireland's national police force announced that they would study the report to see if it provided any new evidence for prosecuting clerics for assault, rape or other criminal offences. The report, however, did not identify any abusers by name because of a right-to-privacy lawsuit by the Christian Brothers.