We really have no accurate idea as yet of the true scale of this tragedy, writes Patsy McGarry, Religious Affairs Correspondent
It is now beyond debate that the State must begin an investigation into how clerical child sex abuse has been handled by the Catholic Church authorities in Ireland.
The reaction to Thursday's Prime Time programme on how the issue has been handled in the Dublin archdiocese indicates clearly that the Irish public has lost any remaining belief that the Church can be trusted to conduct such investigations appropriately, in Dublin or elsewhere in Ireland.
This lack of trust effectively renders redundant the Hussey Commission set up by the bishops last June to investigate how complaints about such abuse have been handled in the 26 dioceses on the island over the decades.
Indeed, the question has to be asked: why has the Garda not become involved already? For example, it had grounds in 1996-67 when Cardinal Connell and the chancellor of the Dublin archdiocese, Mgr Alex Stenson, refused to confirm to investigating detectives a confession by Father Paul McGennis that he had abused Marie Collins and other young girls; this despite the chancellor having told Mrs Collins earlier that the priest had acknowledged the abuse.
But as Father McGennis eventually pleaded guilty in court and received a prison sentence, it is not clear what impact, in legal terms, the withholding of such information might have had. But this should have been established.
Last April a Garda spokesman told The Irish Times that no formal complaint had been lodged about the behaviour of the Cardinal or Mgr Stenson in relation to the McGennis investigation.
The spokesman suggested then, too, that the file on the case might be reopened. Nothing has happened since.
The Prime Time programme looked at cases involving just eight priests in the Dublin archdiocese, but as of October 2000 [the last date for which figures are available from the Catholic Communications Office] a total of 48 clergy had been convicted in Ireland of child sex abuse, covering the 17-year period from 1983 to 2000.
Of that figure 40 were convicted in the Republic. Of the total, 18 were diocesan priests serving in Ireland, three were diocesan priests serving abroad, two were former diocesan priests, 10 were religious order priests, nine were religious order brothers, two were former religious order priests, and three were former religious order brothers.
At that time also, a further two diocesan priests were on remand, as was another priest of unidentified status, one religious order priest, nine religious order brothersand seven former religious order brothers.
Earlier this year, and in addition to those figures, three further priests were suspended in the Dublin archdiocese pending investigation and two more in Ferns diocese.
Prime Time revealed that 450 legal actions were pending in the Dublin archdiocese as a result of child sex abuse, 150 of those from clerical abuse and an estimated 300 from abuse in industrial schools.
What is clear from all of this is that there is as yet no reliable account of the numbers who have suffered clerical child sex abuse or of the perpetrators. It should be remembered, for instance, that of the eight priests in the Dublin archdiocese dealt with on the Prime Time programme neither Father Patrick Hughes nor Father Noel Reynolds ever appeared before the courts.
This is despite Father Hughes's paying £50,000 plus £6,000 costs to a victim in 1993, and Father Reynolds admitting to the abuse of over 100 children.
We really have no accurate idea as yet of the true scale of this tragedy, and this, in part at least, is down to the manner in which the issue has been handled by the Catholic Church authorities in Ireland.
The Prime Time programme has galvanised the public's determination to correct this. And, although much in it was not new, it did reveal much that was, particularly as regards Father Noel Reynolds and the handling of that case by the archdiocese.
It also revealed for the first time that Bishop Willie Walsh of Killaloe and Bishop John McAreavey of Dromore [then priests themselves] were on the tribunal in 1992 which decided that Father Tony Walsh should be defrocked, despite which he continued to offend until charged in 1995.
Both bishops may argue that they had no choice in the matter as Father Walsh was appealing their finding to Rome. But what is beyond doubt is that both men knew exactly the gravity of what Father Walsh had been up to and that neither felt it necessary to report such depravity to the civil authorities, even if this meant Walsh would continue to abuse children, as he did.
The programme also revealed the inaction of Auxiliary Bishops James Kavanagh and Dermot O'Mahony, even though both were made explicitly and repeatedly aware of abuse by Father Walsh and Father Ivan Payne, respectively.
It further revealed that the Bishop of Limerick, Dr Donal Murray, then an auxiliary bishop in Dublin, "passed on" complaints about Father Thomas Noughton, as did the Bishop of Kildare and Leighlin, Dr Jim Moriarty, when he, too, was told, as an auxiliary bishop in Dublin, about Father Paul McGennis. And none of the latter four bishops felt it necessary to "pass on" their information to gardaí.