06 December 2009 By John Burke Public Affairs Correspondent
The commission investigating the handling of abuse claims in the diocese of Cloyne has said it will not use diplomatic channels to request information from the Vatican.
A spokesman for the three person commission, which also conducted last month’s report into abuse in the Dublin archdiocese, said that the inquiry team took the view that it was seeking information from the Church as a body, and not from the Vatican as a state.
The Vatican has said it will not correspond with any inquiry outside diplomatic channels via the Department of Foreign Affairs.
The Vatican and papal nuncio did not respond to correspondence from the commission, which is headed by Judge Yvonne Murphy, when it was working on its investigation into the handling of abuse claims in Dublin.
The Sunday Business Post has learned that the commission has not been consulted ahead of a meeting this week between Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin and papal nuncio Archbishop Giuseppe Leanza, at which the matter is expected to be raised.
The commission is currently in the investigative phase in its examination of the handling of abuse claims in Cloyne diocese. Any request to the Vatican for files or reports sent to it by the Cloyne diocese, if necessary, would be made in the coming weeks.
The Vatican and two papal nuncios, including Leanza, failed to respond to three letters from the commission during its probe into clerical child abuse in Dublin.
In September 2006, the commission wrote to the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, seeking details on reports of clerical child sex abuse sent in from Dublin.
In February of the following year, the commission wrote to the then papal nuncio, Archbishop Giuseppe Lazzarotto, asking that he forward all documents relevant to it which had not been produced by the Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin.
Leanza failed to reply to a further letter earlier this year in which the commission set out its draft findings.
Sunday Business Post 13th December 2009
Hi: The Commission is correct in identifying that the state that the seeking information from the Church as a body, and not from the Vatican as a state. These are indeed 2 separate entities. The Vatican State appears at least to me to have its main activities concentrated on a limited number of issues.
One of the main activities that at least the published information appears to underline is their ability as a State to produce postage stamps.
Interestingly, one Irish company seems to benefit from this activity, the printer BDT (Ireland)who in 2009 alone appear to have produced 4 sets of commemorative stamps for the Vatican State:
560,000 complete series Price: Euro 0.85
560,000 complete series Price: Euro 3.40
200,000 complete series Price: Euro 2.85
200,000 complete series Price: Euro 6.50
300,000 complete series Price: Euro 0.65
The total sales of Vatican stamp and related postage products is set to well exceed 10 millions this year alone and to this you would have to add their coin and other related items.
Pity this management approach is not being use to dealing with child abuse issues…or are all the best managers employed by the Vatican state rather than the church.
As the current Pope’s image appears on many of these items, and his performance in relation to managing child abuse across the Church, has been, to say the least less than Christian, if there was any justice there would be the same impact on this type of promotional sales as there was recently seen in relation to Tiger Woods.
Clever Boys, trying to use Diplomatic Immunity.
May Lady Justice reward them for their wickedness and return to them all the pain and suffering they have inflicted on all innocent human beings, in accordance with the Law of the Universe.
The arrogance of the church beggars belief! If the majority of us were to vote on the Nuncio and his representing the Church I’d wager that he’d be kicked back to Rome and that would be too good for him. He covered up a crime and that’s punishable by law. He was a man before he was a ‘religious’ person so the law of the land supersedes Canon Law. We’re all tired of their perversions and it’s now time we did something about it instead of this bloody rhetoric!!