Why no outrage or multiple threads about this?

[No wides]

This thread is exposing the irrational anti Catholicism of most posters on this board who continue to blame a 30 something junior cleric,over 40 years ago,for the entire failings of the Catholic Church in terms of child abuse in general.

There were no abused families,there were abused family members, whose parents displayed what would nowadays be termed criminal negligence in their failure to ascertain the reasons why their small children were summoned to a meeting with adult priests,and then,unbelievably drove them to the meeting and allowed them to attend unaccompanied.Thank God my parents weren't remotely negligent like that, and you would have been hard pushed to find more devout Catholic parents than mine.

So Sean Brady wasnt negligent, but the boys family was?
Is taht what youa re saying Tony?

Plus all this 'young priest' BS when defending brady, he was in his mid 30s FFS. If you cant make the right moral judgement at that age, you will never be able to.
I am in my mid 30s now, i certainly would never try and use my age as a defence for anything.

I think tony has a good point here ,
why if the family believed a crime had taken place would they not bring it to the authorities ?
is it because they like the church thought it would be swept under the carpet and not have to deal with it themselves?

more worryingly is that figure mentioned earlier  that 4% of father abuse their children much like priests. on a rough estimate of 1 million men of parenting age that would leave at least 40,000 active pedophiles in the country .now there a heading for the sunday world .

That is a hell of an insult to victims and families of victims, you should be ashamed of that statement.

[Hardy]

This thread is exposing the irrational anti Catholicism of most posters on this board who continue to blame a 30 something junior cleric,over 40 years ago,for the entire failings of the Catholic Church in terms of child abuse in general.

There were no abused families,there were abused family members, whose parents displayed what would nowadays be termed criminal negligence in their failure to ascertain the reasons why their small children were summoned to a meeting with adult priests,and then,unbelievably drove them to the meeting and allowed them to attend unaccompanied.Thank God my parents weren't remotely negligent like that, and you would have been hard pushed to find more devout Catholic parents than mine.

So Sean Brady wasnt negligent, but the boys family was?
Is taht what youa re saying Tony?

Plus all this 'young priest' BS when defending brady, he was in his mid 30s FFS. If you cant make the right moral judgement at that age, you will never be able to.
I am in my mid 30s now, i certainly would never try and use my age as a defence for anything.

I think tony has a good point here ,
why if the family believed a crime had taken place would they not bring it to the authorities ?
is it because they like the church thought it would be swept under the carpet and not have to deal with it themselves?

more worryingly is that figure mentioned earlier  that 4% of father abuse their children much like priests. on a rough estimate of 1 million men of parenting age that would leave at least 40,000 active pedophiles in the country .now there a heading for the sunday world .

Is this post meant to suggest that the father of this victim of Smyth and Brady was an abuser himself?

If not, what exactly is the point of this post in the context of this thread?

[Applesisapples]

This thread is an irrelevance. It is trying to excuse the cover-up of abuse in the Church by pointing the finger elsewhere. I wouldn't for one minute offer any excuse for secular organisations trying to cover their own arses, it is not on. But the Church in Ireland and elsewhere set itself up as the arbiter of the moral code by which we should live our lives, it decided what was sinful and what wasn't and in that context that makes its actions much much worse. No amount of waffle from Tony over God knows how many threads and posts can change that. I say this as a Catholic who in this instance still loves the sinner (The Church) whilst despising the sin. I have said before I can accept to a certain degree the predicament Brady was in as a youngish Priest in an unforgiving environment. But as Bishop he could have taken a lead, he could have come clean and castigated the then Hierarchy as complicit in the cover up of sinful and criminal actions. He chose not to and that is unforgivable. Except of course to Tony who has his own freewheeling moral compass which allows him to defend paedophiles whilst damning Gay people to hell.

[Franko]

This thread is an irrelevance. It is trying to excuse the cover-up of abuse in the Church by pointing the finger elsewhere. I wouldn't for one minute offer any excuse for secular organisations trying to cover their own arses, it is not on. But the Church in Ireland and elsewhere set itself up as the arbiter of the moral code by which we should live our lives, it decided what was sinful and what wasn't and in that context that makes its actions much much worse. No amount of waffle from Tony over God knows how many threads and posts can change that. I say this as a Catholic who in this instance still loves the sinner (The Church) whilst despising the sin. I have said before I can accept to a certain degree the predicament Brady was in as a youngish Priest in an unforgiving environment. But as Bishop he could have taken a lead, he could have come clean and castigated the then Hierarchy as complicit in the cover up of sinful and criminal actions. He chose not to and that is unforgivable. Except of course to Tony who has his own freewheeling moral compass which allows him to defend paedophiles whilst damning Gay people to hell.

I've said it a few times, but I'll try it one more time.  If you don't reply to Tony's shite, you don't give threads like this the chance to develop.  Let him have his first post, open the thread, ignore what he's said, close it again and watch it drift away into the ether with the rest of the bullshit.

[seafoid]

I have an uncle who is a priest and we were talking one time about the Church and he said the abuse story would kill it in Ireland. I thought he was being unduly pessimistic then but I wouldn't any more. The support for immorality that Tony F repeats every time he posts on the subject more or less proves it. the rape of children is unacceptable .

[muppet]

This thread is exposing the irrational anti Catholicism of most posters on this board who continue to blame a 30 something junior cleric,over 40 years ago,for the entire failings of the Catholic Church in terms of child abuse in general.

There were no abused families,there were abused family members, whose parents displayed what would nowadays be termed criminal negligence in their failure to ascertain the reasons why their small children were summoned to a meeting with adult priests,and then,unbelievably drove them to the meeting and allowed them to attend unaccompanied.Thank God my parents weren't remotely negligent like that, and you would have been hard pushed to find more devout Catholic parents than mine.

So Sean Brady wasnt negligent, but the boys family was?
Is taht what youa re saying Tony?

Plus all this 'young priest' BS when defending brady, he was in his mid 30s FFS. If you cant make the right moral judgement at that age, you will never be able to.
I am in my mid 30s now, i certainly would never try and use my age as a defence for anything.

I think tony has a good point here ,
why if the family believed a crime had taken place would they not bring it to the authorities ?
is it because they like the church thought it would be swept under the carpet and not have to deal with it themselves?

more worryingly is that figure mentioned earlier  that 4% of father abuse their children much like priests. on a rough estimate of 1 million men of parenting age that would leave at least 40,000 active pedophiles in the country .now there a heading for the sunday world .

Remarkable post.

The family didn't go to the authorities because of the assurances given by the two priests, Brady and Donnelly (I think) that Smyth wouldn't bother Boland or any other child again. When they subsequently discovered that nothing whatsoever had been done about Smyth, the Dad went to the Gardai.

[T Fearon]

Point out to me where I condoned never mind supported paedophiles? By referring to instances of child abuse unfettered in the NHS and BBC in the 70s was simply to point out the culture of the time,in that organisations'reputations meant more than the fate of victims,and no one knew or apparently wanted to get to grips with this abomination,and blind eyes were turned or perpetrators moved on to other areas for someone else to deal with the problem.

Child abuse was mishandled in the Catholic Church then,as it was mishandled everywhere else.But we are examining Sean Brady's role, as a youngish priest with little influence (who happened 30 years later to become Cardinal),constrained by archaic protocols in a top heavy bureaucracy.

It is my view, that having been charged with examining allegations and reporting them,he fulfilled this role,and in my view has every moral right to consider his conscience to be clear.In short the victims of Smyth were let down by senior clerics in the Church,not the relatively junior Sean Brady

[Newbridge Exile]

This thread is an irrelevance. It is trying to excuse the cover-up of abuse in the Church by pointing the finger elsewhere. I wouldn't for one minute offer any excuse for secular organisations trying to cover their own arses, it is not on. But the Church in Ireland and elsewhere set itself up as the arbiter of the moral code by which we should live our lives, it decided what was sinful and what wasn't and in that context that makes its actions much much worse. No amount of waffle from Tony over God knows how many threads and posts can change that. I say this as a Catholic who in this instance still loves the sinner (The Church) whilst despising the sin. I have said before I can accept to a certain degree the predicament Brady was in as a youngish Priest in an unforgiving environment. But as Bishop he could have taken a lead, he could have come clean and castigated the then Hierarchy as complicit in the cover up of sinful and criminal actions. He chose not to and that is unforgivable. Except of course to Tony who has his own freewheeling moral compass which allows him to defend paedophiles whilst damning Gay people to hell.

I've said it a few times, but I'll try it one more time.  If you don't reply to Tony's shite, you don't give threads like this the chance to develop.  Let him have his first post, open the thread, ignore what he's said, close it again and watch it drift away into the ether with the rest of the bullshit.

Agree 100%

[93-DY-SAM]

I've said it a few times, but I'll try it one more time.  If you don't reply to Tony's shite, you don't give threads like this the chance to develop.  Let him have his first post, open the thread, ignore what he's said, close it again and watch it drift away into the ether with the rest of the bullshit.

+1

[rosnarun]

This thread is exposing the irrational anti Catholicism of most posters on this board who continue to blame a 30 something junior cleric,over 40 years ago,for the entire failings of the Catholic Church in terms of child abuse in general.

There were no abused families,there were abused family members, whose parents displayed what would nowadays be termed criminal negligence in their failure to ascertain the reasons why their small children were summoned to a meeting with adult priests,and then,unbelievably drove them to the meeting and allowed them to attend unaccompanied.Thank God my parents weren't remotely negligent like that, and you would have been hard pushed to find more devout Catholic parents than mine.

So Sean Brady wasnt negligent, but the boys family was?
Is taht what youa re saying Tony?

Plus all this 'young priest' BS when defending brady, he was in his mid 30s FFS. If you cant make the right moral judgement at that age, you will never be able to.
I am in my mid 30s now, i certainly would never try and use my age as a defence for anything.

I think tony has a good point here ,
why if the family believed a crime had taken place would they not bring it to the authorities ?
is it because they like the church thought it would be swept under the carpet and not have to deal with it themselves?

more worryingly is that figure mentioned earlier  that 4% of father abuse their children much like priests. on a rough estimate of 1 million men of parenting age that would leave at least 40,000 active pedophiles in the country .now there a heading for the sunday world .

Remarkable post.

The family didn't go to the authorities because of the assurances given by the two priests, Brady and Donnelly (I think) that Smyth wouldn't bother Boland or any other child again. When they subsequently discovered that nothing whatsoever had been done about Smyth, the Dad went to the Gardai.

why not go to the Gardai first?
anyway my point is we can be as out raged as we like about child abuse  but if the figure Quoted are correct the it is  much more prevalent part of society and human nature that we care to think about, Its very easy to hate bogey men such as Priests and odd celebrities like jimmy saville and rolf harris or whoever  but the reality is most child abusers are Family members,
It is a subject that need much closer examination and spewing condemation and hatred may sooth some people conscience but it will also ensures nothing changes

[muppet]

This thread is exposing the irrational anti Catholicism of most posters on this board who continue to blame a 30 something junior cleric,over 40 years ago,for the entire failings of the Catholic Church in terms of child abuse in general.

There were no abused families,there were abused family members, whose parents displayed what would nowadays be termed criminal negligence in their failure to ascertain the reasons why their small children were summoned to a meeting with adult priests,and then,unbelievably drove them to the meeting and allowed them to attend unaccompanied.Thank God my parents weren't remotely negligent like that, and you would have been hard pushed to find more devout Catholic parents than mine.

So Sean Brady wasnt negligent, but the boys family was?
Is taht what youa re saying Tony?

Plus all this 'young priest' BS when defending brady, he was in his mid 30s FFS. If you cant make the right moral judgement at that age, you will never be able to.
I am in my mid 30s now, i certainly would never try and use my age as a defence for anything.

I think tony has a good point here ,
why if the family believed a crime had taken place would they not bring it to the authorities ?
is it because they like the church thought it would be swept under the carpet and not have to deal with it themselves?

more worryingly is that figure mentioned earlier  that 4% of father abuse their children much like priests. on a rough estimate of 1 million men of parenting age that would leave at least 40,000 active pedophiles in the country .now there a heading for the sunday world .

Remarkable post.

The family didn't go to the authorities because of the assurances given by the two priests, Brady and Donnelly (I think) that Smyth wouldn't bother Boland or any other child again. When they subsequently discovered that nothing whatsoever had been done about Smyth, the Dad went to the Gardai.

why not go to the Gardai first?
anyway my point is we can be as out raged as we like about child abuse  but if the figure Quoted are correct the it is  much more prevalent part of society and human nature that we care to think about, Its very easy to hate bogey men such as Priests and odd celebrities like jimmy saville and rolf harris or whoever  but the reality is most child abusers are Family members,
It is a subject that need much closer examination and spewing condemation and hatred may sooth some people conscience but it will also ensures nothing changes

Excusing the covering up of abuse ensures abuse continues and nothing changes. Most of us would expect more of our moral guardians but if you simply consider priest as oddballs, then I can see your reasoning.

I gave the reason why they didn't go to the Gardai first. The boy went to his local priest. This priest went immediately to the family and informed them. The family were told that there would be a Canonical Investigation and after that investigation the father was told Smyth would bother no child again. When they discovered he had continued to abuse, they went to the police. You can disagree with their actions with the benefit of hindsight, but like your point above, you can surely see their reasoning.

[T Fearon]

Rsonarun. Anti catholics have no sympathy for the victims of child abuse, its just another stick for them to beat the church they hate with a passion. So much the better if they can root out some skeleton from the cupboard of a Cardinal decades ago.

I have said before, and by doing so I am not in any way condoning child abuse or the mismanagement of same in any era, that the world was a hell of a lot less sophisiticated in the 1970s,and at an institutional level the culture throughout all organisations who didnt know how to deal with it, was to turn a blind eye or move the problem on. This was wrong, as were many things in decades past.

In the late 70s I was involved on the periphery of a child abuse scandal, when in my student days a work colleague abused two young boys while taking them swimming.The parents, on hearing of the abuse from their children, went straight to the Police, and the culprit was swiftly arrested, charged, convicted and imprisoned (though there were no sex registers in those days so I don't know if he was supervised on his release).

That, in the 70s, as in any other era was an example of good family relations (the boys who were primary school kids were able to tell their parents) and good parenting (they immediately went to the Police)

[muppet]

Rsonarun. Anti catholics have no sympathy for the victims of child abuse, its just another stick for them to beat the church they hate with a passion. So much the better if they can root out some skeleton from the cupboard of a Cardinal decades ago.

I have said before, and by doing so I am not in any way condoning child abuse or the mismanagement of same in any era, that the world was a hell of a lot less sophisiticated in the 1970s,and at an institutional level the culture throughout all organisations who didnt know how to deal with it, was to turn a blind eye or move the problem on. This was wrong, as were many things in decades past.

In the late 70s I was involved on the periphery of a child abuse scandal, when in my student days a work colleague abused two young boys while taking them swimming.The parents, on hearing of the abuse from their children, went straight to the Police, and the culprit was swiftly arrested, charged, convicted and imprisoned (though there were no sex registers in those days so I don't know if he was supervised on his release).

That, in the 70s, as in any other era was an example of good family relations (the boys who were primary school kids were able to tell their parents) and good parenting (they immediately went to the Police)

Tony, given your relationship with the truth of Brady's behaviour (you still pretend he was merely a 'notary'), I don't believe a single word of your story, which as usual comes without a link or a source.

There was a huge difference between a kid being terrified of a swimming coach and being terrified of going to hell for ratting on a priest. That is how Brendan Smyth operated and some of the victims never told the parents, even as adults, due to the fear and shame. You blaming them and their families for this is some of the lowest stuff I've seen on the internet.

[T Fearon]

I am not going to divulge any names in this case.The victims are grown adults and the perpetrator is deceased.He wasn't a swimming coach,but a leisure centre employee.

Priest or no priest,the parents should have been told.They should have made it their business to find out why their young children were summoned to attend a meeting with clergy (an extraordinary circumstance), they must share the blame along with many others,clerical and lay,who failed to stop Smyth.

[reddgnhand]

I am not going to divulge any names in this case.The victims are grown adults and the perpetrator is deceased.He wasn't a swimming coach,but a leisure centre employee.

Priest or no priest,the parents should have been told.They should have made it their business to find out why their young children were summoned to attend a meeting with clergy (an extraordinary circumstance), they must share the blame along with many others,clerical and lay,who failed to stop Smyth.

Are you a parent?