37 YEAR WAIT: newspaper

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Tuesday, 2 April 2013

Irish Times article 02 April 2013 - Misplaced guilt.

Irish Times - 02 April 2013 - CLICK TO READ

The destructive power of unjustified guilt in sex abuse cases has been demonstrated again and again. Last month we saw yet another example when a former priest, Patrick McCabe, was convicted of sexually abusing two boys in the 1970s.

One of the telling aspects of the case was a statement by one of the victims, now 50, who said that in the aftermath of the abuse he felt he had failed his family.

I think it is of great importance for those who are abused and for their relatives to understand that inappropriate guilt is a feature of these acts of criminality both for abused children and for adults who are sexually abused by other adults. The destructive effects of such emotions are mentioned again and again in the aftermath of abuse cases. It may be that sense of guilt and shame that drives some abused people towards suicide or other self-destructive behaviours.

Sexual abuse is a shameful act and there is something in us as humans that feels tainted even though we have been the unwilling objects of a shameful act by another. This may be due to our psychological defensive system. Imagine that you provide security for a building and that the building is robbed. The guilt for this act belongs to those who have planned and carried out the robbery. But a focus of the inquiry that immediately begins will be, why didn’t the defences work? One could even imagine the person who was in charge of the security system feeling a certain amount of inappropriate guilt about the robbery. This is an example of how being the victim of abuse could actually lead a person to feel a sense of inappropriate guilt.

Possible culprit
The other possible culprit for this sense of inappropriate guilt is that part of the mind which is so quick to go on the attack when anything goes wrong.

Notice some of the really harsh things you say to yourself over the smallest mistakes or stumbles in your day. Most of us, if we really listen to these things and reflect on them can be astonished by the harshness of these self judgements. In my opinion, these harsh self judgements play a role in depression and suicide – and indeed we very often hear of suicidal thinking and suicidal behaviour as a feature of the damage done by sexual abusers. That harsh critic in the mind will attack the person who has been subjected to sexual abuse. This critic has nothing to do with conscience or indeed with logic. It can be irrational and cruel and all the more distressing for all of that. And because sexuality is at the very depth of our being that voice of guilt and of shame can be astonishingly deep.

One of the victims of McCabe said he had “experienced every emotion associated with self-loathing”. Even worse than that, perhaps, this man feels guilt for the deaths of his parents when they were only in their 50s and who seem to have suffered from that same poisonous, inappropriate guilt. “They had tried to give me a good foundation for my future and instead they felt responsible for sending me into a lion’s den,” he told the court in his victim impact statement. The part of the mind would attack you in this way was called by Freud “the superego”. It is terribly important to understand that the superego is an irrational, malfunctioning and dangerous part of the mind.

Painful feature
What is worth taking out of all this is the realisation that persons subjected to abuse, assault and especially sexual exploitation suffer enormously from inappropriate guilt and shame. It is important that the persons feeling this guilt and shame understand that it is inappropriate and that they should not allow this to stop them from seeking help. It is also very important that those who seek to support such persons be aware of this very destructive and very painful feature of abuse.

Padraig O’Morain (pomorain@yahoo.com) is a counsellor accredited by the Irish Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy. His Light Mind – Mindfulness for Daily Living book is published by Veritas. His monthly mindfulness newsletter is available free by email

Sunday, 31 March 2013

Murphy report - Chapter 20 - Irish media pressing for release.

Sunday Independent 31st March

Censored section in Murphy sex abuse report set to be published

SUNDAY INDEPENDENT - RUAIDHRI GIBLIN – 31 MARCH 2013

A censored chapter in Judge Yvonne Murphy's report into the handling of clerical child sex abuse allegations by the Catholic Church and State is finally set for full publication.

Chapter 20 has remained censored on foot of a High Court direction that its full publication could damage the trial of a defrocked priest charged with the sexual assault of children in the 1970s and 80s.

Former priest Patrick McCabe was sentenced last week by the Circuit Criminal Court after having pleaded guilty to indecently assaulting two 13-year-old boys.

Although sentenced by Judge Margaret Heneghan to two concurrent 18-month jail terms, he walked free from the court because he had already been in custody for longer than the sentences handed down.

As a result of his trial, there is now no further need for the blanked-out chapter to remain secret.

McCabe was extradited from California in June 2011 and had been in custody for 21 months awaiting sentence. His identity could not be revealed last year when he pleaded guilty to indecently assaulting five other boys.

The handling of complaints made against McCabe was the subject of chapter 20 in the Commission of Inquiry into the Dublin diocese, chaired by Judge Yvonne Murphy and known as the Murphy Report.

The inquiry was set up by Government to investigate how church and State handled clerical child sex abuse allegations in the Dublin diocese between 1975 and 2004.

The report examined the handling of complaints made against a representative sample of 46 priests, though complaints had been levelled against more than 100. The report was published in 2009.

Chapter 19, also censored for similar legal reasons, was not published until the sentencing in 2010 of Tony Walsh, "probably the most notorious" abuser, according to the report.

Among the 50 pages of chapter 20, many of which were published blank, it was stated that the McCabe case "encapsulates everything that was wrong" with the Dublin diocese's handling of child sexual abuse cases.

According to the report, Archbishop Ryan not only knew about the complaints against McCabe but had "protected him to an extraordinary extent. . . It seems that the welfare of children simply did not play any part in his decisions", it stated.

Judge Murphy went on to state that "connivance by the gardai in effectively stifling one complaint and failing to investigate another, and in allowing [McCabe] to leave the country was shocking".

Following McCabe's sentencing, one of his victims, James Moran, waived his right to anonymity.

He said on Wednesday that he was alarmed to discover it could be months before the remainder of the Murphy Report was published.

Mr Moran said the legal reasons for withholding parts of chapter 20 no longer existed, and he had written to Minister for Justice Alan Shatter asking him for the date of release.

No further victims of McCabe are due to come before the courts, so there are no implications for the Murphy Report, Mr Moran said.

"Surely the time to release it is now, so the Irish people and the wider world will discover the truth, even if unpalatable," he said.

In a victim impact statement submitted to the court, Mr Moran said his voice was being heard after a long and painful journey.

"I have waited nearly 37 years for acknowledgment and justice," he said, adding that he often thought of all the victims who had been too afraid or too ashamed to come forward and expose the contamination within the church.

McCabe had changed the path of his life for ever, and while he may never be able to forgive completely, he wanted to begin some kind of healing process, he said.

Monday, 25 March 2013

Murphy report release imminent.

UPDATE - RELEASE NOW DELAYED CLICK HERE TO READ MORE

McCabe was the final abuser mentioned in the Murphy report, to come before the courts. It therefore leads the way for the long awaited full publication. Extracts already published highlight major failings in the way church and state investigated clerical sexual abuse. Judge Yvonne Murphy pulls no punches when she gave her assessment of this redacted chapter:

"This case encapsulates everything that was wrong with the archdiocesan handling of child sexual abuse cases." Ryan protected McCabe. "The connivance by the Gardaí in effectively stifling one complaint and failing to investigate another, and in allowing Fr [McCabe] to leave the country is shocking."

If this comment has been released, we await with bated breath to see what's been redacted.

UPDATE - RELEASE NOW DELAYED CLICK HERE TO READ MORE