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THERE HAS BEEN criticism again today of the pope’s comments about clerical abuse in his Knock Shrine speech.
Pope Francis addressed the crowd at the shrine earlier today, telling them that in his silent prayer to the statue of the Virgin Mary, he presented to her all of the victims of abuse committed by members of the Church in Ireland.
“None of us can fail to be moved by the stories of young people who suffered abuse, were robbed of their innocence and left scarred by painful memories. This open wound challenges us to be firm and decisive in the pursuit of truth and justice,” he said.
I beg the lord’s forgiveness for these sins and for the scandal and betrayal felt by so many others in God’s family. I ask our blessed mother to intercede for the healing of the survivors and to confirm every member of our Christian family in the resolve never again to permit these situations to occur.
Yesterday the pontiff met with eight survivors of clerical, religious and institutional abuse, including Paul Redmond of the Coalition of Mother and Baby Home Survivors.
He said the pope had apologised for what happened in the Church-run homes and condemned the corruption and cover-up as “caca”, translated as “filth one sees in a toilet”.
The pontiff also addressed the issue of clerical abuse in his keynote speech at Dublin Castle yesterday, commenting that be could not fail to “acknowledge” the scandal. Abuse survivors pointed out he did not apologise to them publicly and he did not mention the overall responsibility of the Church in relation to this abuse.
There was similar criticism of the pope’s address this morning, including his choice of the word “sins” in referring to acts of child sexual abuse.
Abuse survivor Colm O’Gorman pointed out that, again, the pope did not mention accountability “or the Vatican’s responsibility for directing the cover up of these crimes”.
“The ‘firm and decisive’ language is of note. Yesterday, [Pope Francis] described Pope Benedict action as recognising the gravity of the situation and demanding ‘just & effective’ measures. How did that go?”
O’Gorman has organised an event at the Garden of Remembrance to support abuse survivors. It will coincide with this afternoon’s mass in the Phoenix Park at 2.30pm. Artists including Hozier, Roisin O from Thanks Brother and Liam O’Maonlai who will perform on stage.
The people gathered will walk silently to Sean McDermott Street to the last remaining Magdalene Laundry in the possession of the State.
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The hospital had to send out staff to the local pub to get ice during this emergency.When I read this in an earlier report I was shocked.
@Tomas: It would make you wonder if there’s some kind of health insurance available to pregnant women that covers an emergency evacuation to a first world country…
@Jason: You would be suprised at the amount of child/adult cases sent abroad every year..
No amount of money will fix his life but I hope he can move on now.
What a loss he has suffered. No amount of money can replace the loss of his beautiful wife and their future together. I hope lessons are learned from this..
A cascade of negligence on top of lack of resources.
Our health services are in shiite because of the people working in them. Blaming the government & HSE is popular & lazy but at some point we will have to blame the staff they are the ones fooking up daily at the coalface.
@Chemical Brothers: The HSE is a bloated mess. The vast majority of hospital workers I have come across are extremely hard working.
It’s funny how some doctors blame the Eighth Amendment (including a certain well-known doctor at Holles Street) for putting pregnant women’s lives in danger – those doctors are doing that quite well all by themselves!
@Ciarán Masterson: interesting you bring up the 8th. It’s because there was a heart beat that she had to undergo surgery rather than take one pill to end the pregnancy.
@Ciarán Masterson: interesting you bring up the 8th. It’s because there was a heart beat that she had to undergo surgery rather than take a pill to end the pregnancy. That’s because of the 8th amendment.
@Ciarán Masterson: the 8th forced this women to go through an unnecessary operation, which led to her death, where a pill would of sufficed. Another victim of Ireland’s archaic laws.
@Liza Latte: not true it only works when there is no heartbeat at the early stages and an operation is the usual procedure to avoid damage to the tubes and rupturing .
@Liza Latte: shows you what you know, the one and only answer to an ectopic pregnancy, which by the way is never ever viable, is operation to remove, there is never any other solution and this is perfectly legal and carried out in Ireland without question, what happened in this case is beyond comprehension what a disgusting lack of basic care, they should hang their heads in shame.
Third World Dublin.
Its disgraceful what is happening in hospitals,government needs to change its prioritys,and a minister that has political will to make changes instead of talking about it.
The amount of the settlement should be made public
..
@Patrick j Brady: Why?
No amount of money will ever replace the loss this man has had to go through. It will be with him for life. Our government should be ashamed, no doubt under staffing had a major factor on this.
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