Irish Priests face five years in jail if they fail to report child abuse

Read the Ryan Report and the other reports on sexual abuse by religious. How many times do you read of victims and their family members saying that the bishops and priests they reported the abuse to encouraged them to re-tell their stories in confession, under a sacramental seal? If they were lured into doing that, they gave the priest or bishop an excuse for never speaking about the crime to law enforcement officials. By this strategy, the confessional became one of the Church's most devious and self-serving means of protecting its own criminals and continuing its criminal activity with impunity. Victims continued to suffer in neglect, and taxpayers are now carrying the financial burden of compensation for the Church's crimes. How can anyone support a strategy that renders the worst of criminals immune from prosecution?

This article is about the crime of abuse of CHILDREN! And some people commenting below think that a priest has the duty to protect a sexual predator from prosecution and thus allow the criminal to continue abusing? How can a priest give absolution to an abuser who refuses to take responsibility for his crime and refuses to accept the punishment of the law for the harm it has caused? What would be the point of confessing such a crime if the abuser insists that the priest protect him from prosecution? Is the sin forgivable when the sinner refuses the punishment? If that is how you want the sacrament of reconciliation to work, then face the truth about yourselves: your Catholic religion is your shield against prosecution for criminal activity! If that's what you are saying-- and it certainly looks like that-- then it's time to outlaw not only the conniving of priests and bishops with abusers, but also the religion itself. No state can afford to grant exemption from criminal prosecution on the basis of religious affiliation. Being a citizen of the state entails moral responsibility, for priests as well as for everyone else. In the US, bishops have been proclaiming their "Zero tolerance" for sexual abuse of children while they have been lobbying state governments NOT to extend the time for filing charges of sexual abuse! "God forgive me, for I repent, but BTW, you must help me escape from prosecution for my crime" -- this is the stance of the American bishops and of those who want an exemption from moral responsibility for priests. Sheer lunacy!

Per the article, in a 10 year period there were 9 alleged instances of abuse that were not reported to the authorities and 6 that were reported by Bishop Magee. Certainly 15 allegations of abuse in 10 years is 15 too many. But still, not "thousands". And likely those allegations involved fewer than 15 priests.

Oh, sorry. Perhaps they were speaking of the situation in Ireland and Australia. Are those the countries where thousands of former priests are a hazard to children's safety?

The claim that thousands of priests are now roaming the country preying on children isn't accurate. First, judging from my diocese, a large percentage of the priests accused are now dead and can't be punished or defend themselves from the accusations. Those who have left the church indeed have now been reported to the police. It is up to the police and courts to register them as sex offenders after they have been found guilty and jailed.

In regards to this article... How will the prosecutor obtain proof that a priest was told about sexual abuse in confession? The priest won't tell. The perpetrator is unlikely to do so. So how could a priest be prosecuted for this 'crime'? Of course they could bug the confessionals but then they'd have the tape and there would be no necessity for the priest to inform on someone. That's why I said it's stupid. It's meaningless. And the posts by Tomassotucson and Eccles64 railing against the bishops' past practices, which were terrible, are not comments on this article at all and do not reflect the current practices, at least in the U.S. where the church now has a zero tolerance policy and does immediately inform the police of any charges made against a priest.

Let's face it, thousands of priest that sexually abused children are roaming this country because the bishops that secretly moved them around to protect them finally had to get rid of them. But they allowed them to leave the ministry without having to register as sex offenders. Now they are your problems so they believe but mot so. You see when they abuse again and get caught, the lawyers will fault the bishops for allowing them to leave the church without having to register as sex offenders and omce again the pay,obey and pray suckers will have to foot the bill. Wake up Church goer, as long as you continue to pay homage to the bishops your going to continue to pay and pay and pay.

About time. I am a bedraggled refugee from the "Holy" Roman Catholic Church, now a Proud Atheist. In Australia where I live the cases pf Pedophilia in the RCC are numerous and the suffering of t he victims is horrendous. Some have suicided. The Roman Catholic hierarchy does NOTHING to help the victims and they do not hand the culprits over to the Police

Catholic priests are free to accept the law of the land or not, just like the rest of us. And just like the rest of us, they'll go to jail if they don't. It's very simple. What's hard to understand about that?

And the courts will find out about this criminal concealing of a penitent's sins in what way? It's a stupid stupid law. But if it ever came right down to it the priest would have to keep his mouth shut and do the time. No choice, really.

So it's only Catholics who are guity of abuse! Ignorance is bliss.

@ Trealach. The Sacrament of Reconciliation IS a man made law!

Should they jail Politicians, Judges, Barristers, Solicitors, Garda and Civil Servants who do not report the systematic fraud of social welfare recipients.

Priests faild to idendify sex abusers even if they lived in the sam building. Why?, because they were concerned about loosing their cozy comfy little corner of the world and or afraid the bishop would find out what they did. Confession was a way out for the sex abuser and also a way for the Priest hearing the confession. It sort of took him off the hook and eased his conscience ??? Concern for the child being abused was his 2nd, no 3rd concern, well maybe he wasn't concered at all.

Wow, I don't know much about Irish politics but this law is definitely one for the books. There isn't a chance in hell that this law will be accepted by Catholic priests nor should it be. I used to deeply respect Ireland's Catholic stance in many laws. Seems that Ireland is becoming overrun by heathens. Sad!