Opinion

Why were the Jesuits silent about abuse in Belvedere, Crescent and Clongowes?

Rite & Reason: Until the rest have been named, there is no context for the life of Joseph Marmion SJ. He operated within an organisation that harboured child abusers

Joseph Marmion died in 2000 without ever having to face justice for his years of abuse of children. Photograph: RTÉ

Tom Doorley
Sun Oct 29 2023 - 07:30

Almost 20 years ago, I had a book published in which I took a brief detour into memories of my schooldays. I mentioned that Belvedere College in Dublin during the 1970s had been dominated by “a priapic colossus” who abused children sexually, emotionally and physically.

I learned much later that the Jesuits prepared a statement to be issued if my revelation prompted media inquiries. However, what I had to say about Joseph Marmion SJ passed unnoticed and the statement was binned.

I knew that Marmion measured boys of 12 to 14 who were taking part in his Viennese operettas, stark naked and alone in his room. When he was named as an abuser in March 2021 I learned much more: as headmaster of Clongowes he savagely beat boys and, on occasion, sexually assaulted them. On his Belvedere trips to Vienna he was known to assault boys, including penetrating them with a thermometer. On one occasion a child was brought to sleep in his room and drugged.

Marmion was named after a lengthy battle conducted by a former pupil who, in frustration, eventually threatened to go public. The Jesuits had no alternative. Almost 100 abuse survivors from Belvedere, Clongowes and the Crescent in Limerick gave testimony in the Restorative Justice Programme organised by the Jesuits.

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The Jesuit Response was presented as an exhaustive trawl through the order’s records relating to Marmion, despite omissions and the absence of documents relating to his being confronted in 1977 and his discreet removal from teaching. A redress scheme was initiated and the Jesuits paid for counselling (from both of which I have benefited).

[Marmion] operated within an organisation that harboured child abusers, and in at least one case, promoted them. He was not alone, although it may suit those who fear for the reputation of the Jesuits and their schools to present Marmion in isolation

I decided to write the story of Joseph Marmion, and the result is a short virtual book called Deny Everything: The Life and Crimes of Joseph Marmion SJ. But while I can tell the story of the man in terms of his childhood, education, formation as a Jesuit, his teaching career and ultimate downfall, there is something missing: context.

Currently there are 43 Jesuits credibly accused of child sexual abuse, eight of them since 2021. One has been named: Joseph Marmion.

Until the rest have been named, there is no context for the life of Marmion. He operated within an organisation that harboured child abusers, and in at least one case, promoted them. He was not alone, although it may suit those who fear for the reputation of the Jesuits and their schools to present Marmion in isolation.

The enormity of his crimes distracts from how he was protected, in life and after his death. Being the grand-nephew of Dom (now Blessed) Columba Marmion OSB, on track to be the first Jesuit-educated saint, may explain how, Houdini-like, he always escaped his just deserts.

In 2004, the Jesuits could have named him and offered the support to victims that those who have come forward since the 2021 admission have received. There are questions to answer for the relevant provincials who must have been aware of several complaints against Jesuits, and one from a former Jesuit abused by Marmion as a child.

A former provincial told one of Marmion’s victims: ‘I wish, once and for all, I could put all the dirty laundry on the table and deal with all of it at the same time.’ There seems to be little chance of that any time soon

Yet nothing was done to publicly acknowledge the abuse. Another of those former provincials, in his submission to the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in 2017, remarked of the Irish bishops: “I wanted to try to understand… why did good people, with high ideals, fail victims so egregiously?” Why, indeed?

The Jesuits, under successive provincials, these “men for others”, simply decided to stay silent. They declined to reach out to the many victims they knew to be there. None has been held accountable.

A former provincial told one of Marmion’s victims: “I wish, once and for all, I could put all the dirty laundry on the table and deal with all of it at the same time.” There seems to be little chance of that any time soon.

Perhaps the boards of management and past pupils’ unions of the Jesuit schools should consider where they stand on the issue.

Tom Doorley is a journalist and author of several books including Muck and Merlot (2004) and Deny Everything: The Life and Crimes of Joseph Marmion SJ (available on Substack).

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