You Have Set Our Errors Right in Front of You...

"From the first persecutions till the present moment, you will find Jews engaged in practically every movement against Our Lord and his Church. A Jew as a Jew is utterly opposed to Jesus Christ and all that the Church means".
- Archbishop McQuaid in 1932, sounding like either Hitler's buddy or Mel Gibson's grand- daddy; take your pick*

"Dr. McQuaid's service to the Truth was shown in his pursuit of right doctrines."
- Archbishop Dermot Ryan, April 1973

By Charley Brady

1964: it's strange how some dates stick with you because of certain specific incidents, isn't it?

I was in my first year of school. We were playing a game of football in the school-yard. Being kids of five and six it was a pretty robust and un-coordinated game. Hell, it was just a game and we were simply booting the ball whenever we got it.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw my teacher trundling past, looking as sour as ever. "Oh God, watch out!" I remember shouting. "You'll hit Mrs. Courtney!"

We didn't hit her with the football I'm now sorry to say.

At the end of the day I was asked to stay back in order to explain why I had used the name of the Lord Our God in vain.

It was reported to my parents and began my life-long aversion to the Catholic Church, though one that for many years would give me mixed feelings.

Flash-forward to 1973 or so and my first contact, now in secondary school with a radically different teacher, Tommy Church, who would profoundly change the way that I thought about things.

He was and is a great guy who gave me a different way of looking at books. He was a tough guy, one whose class you wouldn't mess in; but if a pupil showed an enthusiasm for any particular subject then all that you received was encouragement.

I was so lucky to get him and to this day he remains a friend and someone who really opened up the world of books to me.

Final memory: some six years back I did a blistering attack for another publication on the Archbishop of Dublin, the truly ghastly John Charles McQuaid and I said that through his bullying of a government and a people who were too brow-beaten to stand up to a Church that was doing a lot more damage than it was doing good, should really be considered as a creature who held this country back by decades.

For my "sin" I received one of the most vitriolic and unpleasant letters that I had ever had.

Unpleasant because with the usual bunch of nutters who castigate you through emails this guy had taken the time to actually write a letter, that art form that will soon be as forgotten as telephone booths. He was articulate, if a bit hysterical and as sure as I will be damned forever didn't like me too much.

A lot of these memories poured back in to me as I went through the findings of the Report on the Dublin Diocese and its legacy of Hell for many of the survivors and for the dead who didn't live to see it, censored though it is.

I wonder now what that letter-writer made of the total disgrace, his hero McQuaid who had the myopic vision and lack of humility to consider himself a man of God, when he read that report, if indeed he did so.

Sometimes there are just people, like Pope Benedict who prefer to walk untouched through the raindrops and hope that real life will never touch them.

I did of course write back to that clown and since I don't do nice answers probably made it worse as I tried to explain to someone who didn't want explanations the fact that everything I had written was true and could be proved to be so.

The Report itself is every bit as bad as we had expected it to be and then some.

It begins, of course, with McQuaid, who in his hubris tried and pretty much succeeded for years in turning this country into a reflection of his own fevered dreams where no dissent was possible. He ruled for 33 years here and had an entourage bigger than any Pope ever had.

During his reign over 400 frightened children claimed to have been abused by 152 priests and that in the Dublin area alone.

In 1967 the serial paedophile "Father" (you have to laugh) Noel Reynolds was made secretary of the Diocesan Commission on Religious Instruction in Vocational Schools before being promoted to Diocesan Inspector of Primary Schools.

Jesus wept and must still be weeping: talk about putting a fox in charge of the hen-house.

The bishops were aware that this bastard was responsible for the abuse of over 100 children.

In 1985 we made that good old man of the cloth, Kevin McNamara an Archbishop. There were plenty of important things to do but it was paramount for McNamara to restore "Father" William Carney to his "priestly duties" even though this pig had pleaded guilty to charges of sex abuse only two years beforehand. That's only the ones that we know about although he is suspected of many more.

Still, McNamara (sorry, your appalling cowardly Eminences but I refuse to call him an Archbishop) was smart enough to call in the legal team who told him that the Irish bishops would be exposed to liability in civil claims if they returned priests to parishes where they later re-offended.

Good call, McNamara: we wouldn't like to see the Holy Blessed One and Only True Church of Christ exposed to anything that might cost them a few shekels, no matter the heinousness of the crimes.

Then we come to the saintly Cardinal Connell who allowed - can you believe this, ALLOWED - the police to examine 17 files.

Needless to say this Man of God went on to make light of and rebuke abuse victim Marie Collins.

Personally I don't care that you are now 83, still dressing up in your expensive robes, looking like some aged transvestite; you should be in jail.

You hurt people; you covered up for your cronies and you didn't give two ends of a frog's prick for people who have lived with this horror and will continue to live with it for the rest of their lives.

On the eve of the report which these celestial thugs had tried to block right into the last minute the Christian Brothers managed to cough up more money for compensation, bringing it to €161 million in total. Just out of the wide blue yonder.

Again, a great bunch of guys.

Here are only SOME of these true Christian gentlemen's assets for this year: €8.1 million in deposit accounts.

Investments with Morgan Stanley at €17 million.

My favourite: Ethical Investment Initiative at €3.4 million.

Ethical? The Christian Brothers?

I could go on and on but check it out for yourselves.

Their current investments stand at €51.7 million. And if you believe that it is as little as that then you'll believe that a man can walk on water.

Go figure. Think about it and see if the sums add up.

They have been found to be those most guilty of the rape and torture of young children. There's something wrong somewhere.

Let's look at the likes of that loathsome piece of vermin "Father" Ivan Payne who was chaplain at Our Lady's Children's Hospital. He got four years for sexually abusing eight boys.

I guess that Our Lady was off duty that day, probably planning her next excursion to one of Ireland's many shrines. She has a busy schedule after all. Ivan Payne now lives as happy as Larry in Wales.

Payne of course is now well known for the fact that saintly Cardinal Connell gave him a loan of loot (no doubt from the baskets that you suckers put money into each and every week) in order to pay compensation to one of his victims.

"Father" John Kinsella was released in 2001after serving his sentence for sexual abuse. For personal reasons he's one of my favourite scumbags but despite my best efforts I have been unable to track where he is now living. Maybe Cardinal Connell could give me a loan in order to pursue this. Oh, sorry, I forgot that I'm not a criminal.

Nobody comes out of this well: not the police who felt it was "not in their remit " to question the doings of the Church nor the Government who were scared out of their wits to take on the majesty of the Holy Father of Paedophiles Church.

We have a so-called priest who admits to having raped over twenty children including a little girl that he admits to having raped both vaginally and anally with a crucifix.

There are certain images that, if you read the entire 700-page report I promise you will never leave your head.

I don't and never have pretended to be exactly what I am: a man who is angry a lot of the time and who drinks far too much. I've often wondered if I'm just a bad person. But after reading this report I realise that I'm not as wicked as I like to think I am.

I don't hurt people intentionally, even though I've got a sharp tongue in my mouth.

I don't treat man or woman with disrespect, I hope. I try to be left alone most of the time.

In fact, as an avowed atheist it's strange that I actually live by the Ten Commandments.

I'd like to know why we can only refer to certain priests as Father X.

One of the anonymous ones who was shielded by the police (and they admit this) is the self-serving pervert who actually had the temerity to blame his deviances on experiences that I'm willing to bet never touched his black heart in the slightest.

Here is what the rapist who continued to serve as priest years after Holy Father Church knew what he was came drivelling out with:

"I have grown away from the problems that entered my life surprisingly and abruptly some years ago. It happened during the time of my long Pro-Cathedral ministry with the city-centre bombings [in Dublin] and later my involvement with the aftermath of the Stardust disaster."

Oh, would you please pass me the sick bucket?

Trust me on this one, Father X, anonymous coward that you are, I have had some really crap things happen in my life but they never turned me into a loathsome child molester like you, you ragged piece of rubbish.

Bitter, maybe; but a defiler of weak children? That could never happen. That is something that has to be in you from the beginning.

Admit it, coward, it was in you right from the start and was only exacerbated by the swines that covered up for you.

Isn't it a crime to knowingly cover up a crime?

Isn't this a case where the bishops who knowingly covered for filth like you should be banged up in jail for the rest of their unnatural lives?

Where are the statements from Herr Pope Benedict in all of this? Isn't he the Father of your truly ungodly Church? Doesn't he have something to say about this?

Or is His Holiness more concerned with the effect that innocent things like Halloween and Harry Potter have on the youth of this country?

No statement from Bennie as I write this on Monday morning.

You probably don't even see that you have shamed yourselves; but you have most certainly shamed each and every one of us.

I hope to see you all again next week.

Same bat-time!

Same bat-channel!

* If you are interested in reading the exhaustive and to my mind the definitive biography of McQuaid then check out John Cooney's "John Charles McQuaid: Ruler of Catholic Ireland".

You can reach Charley at chasbrady7@eircom.net