Church in the World

Irish Church sets up abuse commission

Europe

A retired judge, Gillian Hussey, 65, will chair a seven-person Catholic Church Commission on Child Sexual Abuse. The commission is being established jointly by the Irish Bishops? Conference, the Conference of Religious of Ireland and the Irish Missionary Union.

As announced at a press conference in Dublin on 27 June, its purpose is to establish the truth about the extent of child abuse within the Catholic Church in Ireland, and the response of church authorities to complaints about it. The commission will conduct an independent audit as part of its overall review.

The commission?s terms of reference are to examine what the bishop of each diocese and the religious superior of each participating religious congregation knew about complaints of child abuse against diocesan priests and religious, and to identify the steps taken by each; to quantify the extent of abuse by priests and religious and the responses made by bishops and religious superiors; to examine how bishops and religious superiors have implemented the 1996 guidelines in dioceses or congregations generally; to learn how people who reported abuse have been dealt with by church authorities; and to make recommendations.

It was announced that the independent commission, which is to have its own offices in Dublin, is to be formally established on 2 September. It will produce an interim report by 28 February 2003 and a final report by 29 February 2004.