THOUSANDS OF MEN deserted the Irish Defence Forces during the Second World War to fight with the British armed forces. Some did so because of their feelings about fascism, some because they were bored, others for better pay. When those who surivived the war came home they found that, as well as dismissing them from the Defence Forces, Éamon de Valera’s government had, more damagingly, blacklisted them from all state jobs. [… Continue
Charlie 'The Hare' Maguire was one of the dwindling number of survivors from Ireland’s gulag of the 1940s – the industrial school system. A powerless man seemingly perceived as a rural outsider, he spent nearly two-thirds of his life in the custody of the State, and died after nearly half a century as a patient in St Davnet’s hospital in Monaghan.
Charlie Maguire was born in 1933 on a small farm at Knockroe, near the Co Cavan…
He seems to have tackled the issue of child abuse in the diocese head on ... he seems more transparent and approachable. More humane in other words.
On the other hand he hasn't demanded that his predecessor be arrested for the conspiracy that enabled the cover-up! Sure he has demanded that bishops, who were found at fault in the Murphy Report, should resign - but he has no problem sitting down with Drennan - nor it appears has he any problem (publicly) with Cardinal Brady. Brady is… Continue
Added by Andrew Brennan on October 18, 2010 at 15:52 —
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NINE BILLION euros worth of tax breaks enjoyed by the Catholic Church in Italy could be in breach of European law and may have to be repaid, it has emerged.
The development is the latest blow to an institution that has been rocked by an annus horribilis, following the global clerical paedophilia scandal and investigations into money laundering. The European Commission (EC) has said that tax relief on 100,000 Italian properties claimed by the Holy See since 2005 was under the… Continue
It was the time of the year when we'd be off picking the spuds and other "edible" stuff weaing our boots with leather laces, no "wet weather gear" I 'm afraid Fr. O'Reilly - a priest at the Commission seems to have been under the impression that in the Industrial Schools we had clothes for all seasons!
I was abused by a few of the black-garbed monsters. One guy in particular was a voracious scumbag. It was in Ferryhouse. The year was 1967. The month was March. My abuser was a Brother of the Rosminian Order. His name: Br. O'Hanlon.
FACT,
Many children who were placed into Residential Institutes were never
heard of again, they never came home. It was as if they had been
spirited away, vanished from the face of the earth & this indeed is
most odd as it states in the "KENNEDY REPORT" published in 1970
that 238 children absconded from these… Continue
On 15 and 16 February, 2010, the Holy Father met the Irish bishops and senior members of the Roman Curia to discuss the serious situation which has emerged in the church in Ireland. The ‘serious situation’ of two bishops squaring up to each otherand taking lumps out of each other.
Together they examined the failure of Irish church authorities for many years to act effectively in…
Today is the 30th. anniversary of my own mother's death - she is buried in a graveyard in Moneenroe in Castlecomer. Her headstone states that Mary O'Connor (aged 48) lies here. She is also buried in another plot in the same graveyard according to my uncle - her brother!
I have very few memories of her, and the last time I was with her was 1955 when she left Ireland and went to England and re-married and had at least 10 more children. On some occasions she returned to Moneenroe to her… Continue
Judge Ryan. Appointed to a thankless task where the civil and religious authorities both seemed determined upon blocking the work of the Commission into Child Abuse, Judge Sean Ryan produced a 2,500-page report into institutional abuse, every measured word a howling indictment of Ireland's care for its children. His finger pointed unwaveringly at the might of Church and State, becoming a towering allegory for justice denied and delayed, proven…
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