THE CATHOLIC primate Cardinal Seán Brady last night said he would he would ask Pope Benedict to appoint a bishop to assist him and indicated he had decided to stay at the head of the Irish Catholic church.
In a statement issued to welcome yesterday’s report from the Catholic Church watchdog, the National Board for Safeguarding Children, he announced he had “asked Pope Benedict XVI for additional support for my work, at Episcopal level”.
He has done this, so he could be assisted “in addressing the vital work of healing, repentance and renewal, including engagement with survivors of abuse, as well as the many other challenges and opportunities which confront the diocese of Armagh and the church in Ireland at this time.”
The cardinal (70), who had to take time off last month after he became ill at a Confirmation ceremony in Kildress parish church, Co Tyrone, is currently assisted at episcopal level in the Armagh archdiocese by Auxiliary Bishop Gerard Clifford (69).
In the years that remain to him as Archbishop of Armagh, he would be “fully committed to building on the substantial progress made in child safeguarding in recent years and to working to bring about the healing, repentance and renewal set out for the church in Ireland by Pope Benedict XVI,” he said.
Cardinal Brady has faced calls to resign since it emerged on March 14th last that in 1975 he conducted an investigation into allegations of child sex abuse by Fr Brendan Smyth which involved him swearing two teenagers to secrecy.
In his statement he repeated that he had asked for Armagh diocese to be included in the apostolic visitation announced by the pope last March. He had also asked the National Board for Safeguarding Children (NBSC) to prioritise a review and audit of Armagh diocese and committed himself to fully implementing its recommendations and to having its findings published.
He would shortly advertise for a full-time director of child safeguarding for the diocese who would have responsibility for handling all future suspicions and allegations of child abuse, and for reporting these directly to the civil authorities.
The diocese would participate fully in the work of the new Independent Safeguarding Authority in Northern Ireland, including the sharing of “soft” information (sometimes unsubstantiated information). He regretted that the statutory safeguards required to facilitate this were only available in that part of his diocese which is in Northern Ireland. He would welcome the establishment of a similar system for sharing information on a North-South basis.
He thanked the safeguarding children board for “holding us to account and for pointing out frankly and constructively those areas of policy, practice or attitude which require corrective action or further development.”
The board’s report disclosed 197 allegations of physical, emotional but mostly sexual abuse had been made to it in the year to March 31st last. All allegations were made by adults.
Of the 197 individuals against whom allegations were made, some 140 had not faced such allegations before. Some 87 of the allegations related to priests of the 26 Catholic dioceses, while 110 came through religious congregations and missionary societies. All were reported to the relevant statutory authorities.
None of the new allegations were made by children or young people. Some referred to incidents which took place in the 1950s and 1960s but were now emerging for the first time. Some 83 of the 197 alleged perpetrators of abuse were dead. Of the living 114, 35 had been laicised or dismissed from their congregation.
