Both yourself and Donal B write in a clear and highly dignified way about individual clerics’ concealment of criminality.
I really struggle with the legal exceptionalism that is accorded such clerics. In a society where it is a crime not to stop and report a road accident, those who conceal child sexual abuse are not prosecuted.
I believe that more endeavour now should be accorded to getting the mainstream media to focus on this concealment aspect. Donal Balance’s letter attests to the fact that while the abuse is often historical the concealment is ongoing. Child sex abuse is not simply a historical matter. It is current affairs. In many cases, the protagonists are alive and - if I may speak for myself - kicking.
I take heart from the final sentence in Donal Balance’s letter which mentions taking his concerns to ‘other more strident voices’. For too long, the dialogue between survivors and abusers has resembled a cart wheel with mainly solitary and disparate survivors acting like spokes channelling their grievance back to the ecclesiastical hub who duly either ignored and/or smothered their accusations.
If I may mix metaphors given Wimbledon is now on: when one plays tennis, you don’t keep hitting the ball straight back to one’s opponent, you try to move them around the court and expose their weaknesses.
It’s time more survivors took their stories to the public and highlighted clerical concealment. I commend both you and Donal Balance for the role you have both played in exposing ongoing Jesuit concealment of criminal wrongdoing.
As far as I’m concerned, I’m not interested in the simpering apologies of the likes of Shane Daly (Jesuits) and Paschal Scallon (Vincentians). Such characters need to be cross examined under Oath regarding what they know about their current and erstwhile clerical colleagues’ criminal wrongdoings. Put simply, the concealment of criminal activity should carry legal ramifications for them
Moreover, it should not require a tortuous cultural journey undertaken with a paralysing cognitive dissonance and shrouded in faux complexity to see how preposterous the appointment of the likes of Dardis is. Not once we have stripped away the social conditioning that got us into this cultural blind spot in the first instance. Our society has accorded legal exceptionalism to a category of people to whom it is not due. We just need to wake up to that fact.
I think one key problem these days is that the world and the media is bored rigid by clerical child sexual abuse; we have heard it all and are now almost beyond shocking! This of course is very helpful to the religious orders and others whose interests are served by minimising attention, deflecting attention, appearing to offer a full apologia, and generally drawing a line under matters. In this particular instance I think there is a simple question to be asked: Can the Jesuits ever be trusted with children again, and can their breast beating be taken even remotely seriously, when a man like Dardis is (a) in such a position within the organisation and (b) has addressed delegates on safeguarding about how to communicate in cases of abuse. Ever since Donal forced the Society to admit what Marmion was, I have had a strong sense of a buck refusing to stop anywhere!
I guess what I need to think more about are the reasons/causes behind legal inaction and what would make the legal authorities more proactive in taking action against those who conceal criminal activity of this kind.
Is media coverage really required to persuade the legal authorities to prosecute those who conceal criminal wrongdoing ? One might have hoped that shouldn’t be necessary and that legal authorities would act without the media coverage having to direct them in this way.
I realise police resources are allocated often with media coverage sensitivities in mind and perhaps less focused on things which aren’t hitting the headlines.
Yes, good point, Tom. The law is frankly a mystery to me, as it is to most of us and I have no idea how such decisions are made. However, I have a shrewd idea that the more noise made about certain cases the more likely action becomes.
Thank you Tom D for this piece.
Both yourself and Donal B write in a clear and highly dignified way about individual clerics’ concealment of criminality.
I really struggle with the legal exceptionalism that is accorded such clerics. In a society where it is a crime not to stop and report a road accident, those who conceal child sexual abuse are not prosecuted.
I believe that more endeavour now should be accorded to getting the mainstream media to focus on this concealment aspect. Donal Balance’s letter attests to the fact that while the abuse is often historical the concealment is ongoing. Child sex abuse is not simply a historical matter. It is current affairs. In many cases, the protagonists are alive and - if I may speak for myself - kicking.
I take heart from the final sentence in Donal Balance’s letter which mentions taking his concerns to ‘other more strident voices’. For too long, the dialogue between survivors and abusers has resembled a cart wheel with mainly solitary and disparate survivors acting like spokes channelling their grievance back to the ecclesiastical hub who duly either ignored and/or smothered their accusations.
If I may mix metaphors given Wimbledon is now on: when one plays tennis, you don’t keep hitting the ball straight back to one’s opponent, you try to move them around the court and expose their weaknesses.
It’s time more survivors took their stories to the public and highlighted clerical concealment. I commend both you and Donal Balance for the role you have both played in exposing ongoing Jesuit concealment of criminal wrongdoing.
As far as I’m concerned, I’m not interested in the simpering apologies of the likes of Shane Daly (Jesuits) and Paschal Scallon (Vincentians). Such characters need to be cross examined under Oath regarding what they know about their current and erstwhile clerical colleagues’ criminal wrongdoings. Put simply, the concealment of criminal activity should carry legal ramifications for them
Moreover, it should not require a tortuous cultural journey undertaken with a paralysing cognitive dissonance and shrouded in faux complexity to see how preposterous the appointment of the likes of Dardis is. Not once we have stripped away the social conditioning that got us into this cultural blind spot in the first instance. Our society has accorded legal exceptionalism to a category of people to whom it is not due. We just need to wake up to that fact.
Tom Maher
Castleknock College 1974-80
Thank you, Tom
I think one key problem these days is that the world and the media is bored rigid by clerical child sexual abuse; we have heard it all and are now almost beyond shocking! This of course is very helpful to the religious orders and others whose interests are served by minimising attention, deflecting attention, appearing to offer a full apologia, and generally drawing a line under matters. In this particular instance I think there is a simple question to be asked: Can the Jesuits ever be trusted with children again, and can their breast beating be taken even remotely seriously, when a man like Dardis is (a) in such a position within the organisation and (b) has addressed delegates on safeguarding about how to communicate in cases of abuse. Ever since Donal forced the Society to admit what Marmion was, I have had a strong sense of a buck refusing to stop anywhere!
Thanks Tom
Yes, I take the media point you make.
I guess what I need to think more about are the reasons/causes behind legal inaction and what would make the legal authorities more proactive in taking action against those who conceal criminal activity of this kind.
Is media coverage really required to persuade the legal authorities to prosecute those who conceal criminal wrongdoing ? One might have hoped that shouldn’t be necessary and that legal authorities would act without the media coverage having to direct them in this way.
I realise police resources are allocated often with media coverage sensitivities in mind and perhaps less focused on things which aren’t hitting the headlines.
But still. 🤷♂️
Yes, good point, Tom. The law is frankly a mystery to me, as it is to most of us and I have no idea how such decisions are made. However, I have a shrewd idea that the more noise made about certain cases the more likely action becomes.