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  • 15 january 2014: Historical Abuse Inquiry begins public hearings

The Historical Abuse Inquiry, set up by the Northern Ireland Assembly to inquire into abuse of children in state and church institutions in Northern Ireland in the 1922-1995 time period, began its first public hearings on the 12 January 2014 in the courthouse in Banbridge, Co. Down.

For more detail, read more at the BBC here and here.

The role of institutions of the Catholic Church, which has an all-island jurisdiction, will be a significant focus of the inquiry, following recent similar inquiries relating to institutional abuse in church-run institutions in southern Irish society.

  • 2010: Child abuse in the Irish Catholic church

The Irish Catholic church has been recently the center of public debate: the publication of two reports, the Ryan report and the Murphy report – named after the judges who presided over the deliberations of legal inquiries into the running of Catholic institutions called ’industrial schools’ and ’reformatories’ for children, on the onehand, and the Catholic church’s (mis)management of cases of clerical child sex abuse in the Archdiocese of Dublin, on the other, were published in 2009; the information they disclosed concerning violence and abuse against children caused a great shock in public opinion.

A complete article is available concerning this situation: "The Memory and Amnesia of Irish Catholicism", by Brian Conway.

 Report of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse, 2009.
 Commission of Investigation: Report into the Catholic Archdiocese of Dublin, July 2009.

  • 2006: Largest Catholic teaching order reduces role in education

The Christian Brothers, a Roman Catholic teaching order, have been to the forefront of education in Ireland for two centuries. The Brothers have announced their withdrawal from direct involvement in over 29 primary and 109 secondary schools which will be transferred to a charity staffed entirely by lay people. The move has been precipitated by declining vocations but it also comes after a difficult decade in which some members of the order have been convicted of sexual abuse in its institutions.

D 20 October 2023    ABrian Conway


CNRS Unistra Dres Gsrl

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