Pope Benedict appoints new bishop to diocese of Cloyne after sex abuse scandal

Scandal plagued predecessor’s legacy still endures

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Pope Benedict XVI

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Rev Canon William Crean, a parish priest in Cahersiveen, has been named as a new bishop for the scandal plagued diocese of Cloyne, County Cork, where the previous bishop for years ignored his church's own rules requiring priests suspected of sex abuse to be reported to police.

For two years Cloyne has been without a resident bishop since John Magee, originally from Newry in Northern Ireland and who was private secretary to three popes, resigned in disgrace in 2010.

A church-appointed commission found that Magee and his deputies received multiple complaints from parishioners about two pedophile priests in 1995, but failed to alert police until 2003.

According to the Belfast Telegraph, Pope Benedict appointed Crean to the post over the weekend to replace Magee.

The Irish Government's 2011 report into the decades of abuse and cover-up in Cloyne was named the Cloyne Report and it found that the Vatican encouraged concealing crimes against children — a charge that Rome has vigorously denied.

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