- Sexual abuse was 'endemic' in Irish boys' homes
- The Age
- 21/05/2009 Make a Comment
- Contributed by: The Rooster ( 258 articles in 2009 )
Sexual abuse of children was "endemic" in Catholic boys' institutions in Ireland and church leaders turned a blind eye to it, says a report on mistreatment in church-run bodies dating back to the 1930s.
"Children lived with the daily terror of not knowing where the next beating was coming from," the report said. "A climate of fear ... permeated most of the institutions and all those run for boys."
Survivors of abuse in care homes and other institutions run by the Roman Catholic Church voiced immediate disappointment with the report, saying authorities had "abdicated their responsibility".
The largest probe into Irish religious orders found abusers could "operate undetected for long periods at the core of institutions", while victims were sometimes blamed and "punished severely".
"Sexual abuse was endemic in boys' institutions," said the long-awaited major official report, adding: "Sexual abuse was known to religious authorities to be a persistent problem in male religious organisations."
"Nevertheless, each instance of sexual abuse was treated in isolation and in secrecy by the authorities and there was no attempt to address the underlying systemic nature of the problem."
Since 2000, the government-appointed Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse has been investigating allegations of sexual and physical abuse in reform schools, workhouses, orphanages, children's homes and other childcare institutions.
Compensation has been sought by Irish people now living in more than 30 countries with 40 percent of claims from women. About 61 per cent of claimants live in Ireland, 33 per cent in Britain and 4 per cent in Australia and the US.
But a victims group dismissed the report.
"There is nothing by way of justice in any means significant in this report. Nothing," said John Kelly of the Survivors of Child Abuse (SOCA) group, adding that victims of abuse "will also feel that the scars are still left open".
"The state doesn't want the world to know ... that it abdicated its responsibility," he added, saying survivors felt "deceived and cheated".
The report said managers in children's institutions failed to take measures to protect those in their care.
"There were no protocols or guidelines put in place that would have protected children from predatory behaviour," it said.
"The management did not listen to or believe children when they complained of the activities of some of the men who had responsibility for their care. At best, the abusers were moved, but nothing was done about the harm done to the child.
"At worst, the child was blamed and seen as corrupted by the sexual activity, and was punished severely."
Mainly Catholic Ireland has been rocked by recurring revelations of clerical sex abuse of children. Many of the victims had reported the abuse when they were children but were not believed.
Campaigns by victims and a series of television documentaries and police inquiries in the 1990s led to the creation of the government-appointed Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse in 2000.
In 1999, then Prime Minister Bertie Ahern made an unprecedented apology to the victims for Ireland's "collective failure to intervene, to detect their pain, to come to their rescue."
Many of the children ended up in the institutions as a result of family break-up, the death of one parent, because they were illegitimate or after being caught for truancy from school or petty crimes.
AFP
"Children lived with the daily terror of not knowing where the next beating was coming from," the report said. "A climate of fear ... permeated most of the institutions and all those run for boys."
Survivors of abuse in care homes and other institutions run by the Roman Catholic Church voiced immediate disappointment with the report, saying authorities had "abdicated their responsibility".
The largest probe into Irish religious orders found abusers could "operate undetected for long periods at the core of institutions", while victims were sometimes blamed and "punished severely".
"Sexual abuse was endemic in boys' institutions," said the long-awaited major official report, adding: "Sexual abuse was known to religious authorities to be a persistent problem in male religious organisations."
"Nevertheless, each instance of sexual abuse was treated in isolation and in secrecy by the authorities and there was no attempt to address the underlying systemic nature of the problem."
Since 2000, the government-appointed Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse has been investigating allegations of sexual and physical abuse in reform schools, workhouses, orphanages, children's homes and other childcare institutions.
Compensation has been sought by Irish people now living in more than 30 countries with 40 percent of claims from women. About 61 per cent of claimants live in Ireland, 33 per cent in Britain and 4 per cent in Australia and the US.
But a victims group dismissed the report.
"There is nothing by way of justice in any means significant in this report. Nothing," said John Kelly of the Survivors of Child Abuse (SOCA) group, adding that victims of abuse "will also feel that the scars are still left open".
"The state doesn't want the world to know ... that it abdicated its responsibility," he added, saying survivors felt "deceived and cheated".
The report said managers in children's institutions failed to take measures to protect those in their care.
"There were no protocols or guidelines put in place that would have protected children from predatory behaviour," it said.
"The management did not listen to or believe children when they complained of the activities of some of the men who had responsibility for their care. At best, the abusers were moved, but nothing was done about the harm done to the child.
"At worst, the child was blamed and seen as corrupted by the sexual activity, and was punished severely."
Mainly Catholic Ireland has been rocked by recurring revelations of clerical sex abuse of children. Many of the victims had reported the abuse when they were children but were not believed.
Campaigns by victims and a series of television documentaries and police inquiries in the 1990s led to the creation of the government-appointed Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse in 2000.
In 1999, then Prime Minister Bertie Ahern made an unprecedented apology to the victims for Ireland's "collective failure to intervene, to detect their pain, to come to their rescue."
Many of the children ended up in the institutions as a result of family break-up, the death of one parent, because they were illegitimate or after being caught for truancy from school or petty crimes.
AFP
Source: Sexual abuse of children was "endemic" in Catholic boys' institutions in Ireland and church leaders turned a blind eye to it, says a report on mistreatment in church-run bodies dating back to the 1930
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