91Èȱ¬

1.22: Many of the auxiliary bishops also knew of the fact of abuse as did officials such as Monsignor Gerard Sheehy and Monsignor Alex Stenson who worked in the Chancellery. Bishop James Kavanagh, Bishop Dermot OMahony, Bishop Laurence Forristal, Bishop Donal Murray and Bishop Brendan Comiskey were aware for many years of complaints and/or suspicions of clerical child sexual abuse in the Archdiocese.

1.47: One of the principal tasks of the auxiliary bishops was the assignment of priests to parishes, subject to final approval by the Archbishop. In the Dublin Archdiocese priests were reassigned approximately every five years. The evidence shows that these appointments were often made without any reference to child sexual abuse issues. The auxiliary bishops who dealt particularly badly with complaints were Bishops O'Mahony and Kavanagh. Bishop Murray also dealt badly with a number of complaints.

1.53: Bishop Murray was another long serving auxiliary bishop (from 1982 to 1996). He handled a number of complaints and suspicions badly. For example, he did not deal properly with the suspicions and concerns that were expressed to him in relation to Fr Naughton (see Chapter 29). When, a short time later, factual evidence of Fr Naughtons abusing emerged in another parish Bishop Murrays failure to reinvestigate the earlier suspicions was inexcusable. Bishop Murray did, however, accept in 2002 that he had not dealt well with the situation.

1.89: Bishop Murray told the Commission that he did make contemporaneous written notes of the concerns expressed to him by Valleymount parishioners in respect of Fr Naughton. However, there is no contemporaneous record of these notes on the Archdiocesan files.

12.25 Bishop Murray accepted Fr McNamee‟s denials that he had young people in the car. This was the extent of his inquiries.

29.53 In the Commission's view, Bishop Murray must take some responsibility for the very poor handling of complaints against this priest [Fr Naugthton]. The Commission believes it is to his credit that he recognised this when he issued his statement admitting his failure to follow up properly the complaints he had received from Valleymount.

29.54 It is unacceptable that, when the Donnycarney complaints were being discussed by the bishops, he, they and Archbishop McNamara did not return to the Co Wicklow parish and carry out further investigations. This was despite the fact that Bishop Murray told the Commission that he informed the meeting about the two men's complaints about Fr Naughton.

29.55 The archdiocesan authorities were wrong not to inform all priests in Ringsend that there had been a serious complaint about Fr Naughton while he worked in Donnycarney.

29.56 Overall, in their handling of the complaints against Fr Naughton, archdiocesan authorities, particularly Bishop Murray, the Valleymount parish priest and Archbishops Ryan and McNamara let down those families who, because they were good Catholics, trusted the Church to do something about this man. Archbishop McNamara was slow to respond to the complaint from the Rundles despite the priest admitting sexual abuse. As a result, Fr Naughton was allowed to continue his abusive behaviour for several years thereby severely damaging more victims. It was only when they went to the Gardaí that they finally received satisfaction.

29.59 Fr Naughton's case is symptomatic of the Dublin Archdiocese's attitude to child sexual abuse in the 1980s. Until the problem became so great it could not be hidden, the archdiocesan procedure was to do all in its power to protect the wrongdoer, while almost completely ignoring the effect of this abuse on the victims.

Bishop Donal Murray levelled against him in the Dublin report. He writes: "I wish to state that I never deliberately or knowingly sought to cover up or withhold information brought to my attention. There were, as the report notes, occasions when roles/responsibilities were not clear or where I did not have full information concerning cases in which I was asked to become involved. As I indicated in 2002 in response to one particular case, if I had succeeded in deriving more information, it might have been possible to prevent some of the dreadful suffering of child abuse in that instance. I very much wish that I had been able to do so. It is a matter of the greatest regret to me if any action or omission of mine contributed to the suffering of children who were abused. I sincerely apologise and humbly ask their forgiveness."

Bishop Murray now says he will be guided by the priests and people of Limerick on the question of resignation. .

The family of Peter McCloskey, who alleged abuse and died in 2006,.

Following the publication of the Ryan Report, which revealed that the abuse of children was "endemic" in church-run institutions, the Irish President Mary McAleese said the report . In the, Bishop Willie Walsh takes a different view on that question too.

He writes:

"Numerous calls have been made for the perpetrators of abuse to be brought before the courts to be tried for their crimes. I hope I will not cause further offence to victims when I suggest that we need to be cautious in this regard. Apart from cases of extreme abuse I do not see that there will be any healing in attempting to drag large numbers of elderly religious or lay people into courts at this hour of their lives. We should always be careful, of course, about holding people to account for what happened 40 / 50 years ago. If we put people on trial for severe physical punishment administered 40 /50 years ago where do we draw the line. Do we confine it to religious or do we widen it to take in parents, teachers or anyone else who might have taken on the task of disciplining children? I stood in a classroom myself for 25 years and I have no desire to be called to account for every single action of mine over that time!"