Accountability

A second Irish bishop has resigned following a government report into the sexual abuse of children by Catholic clergy.

Bishop Jim Moriarty submitted a letter of resignation Dec. 23. He is bishop of Kildare and Leithlin, southwest of Dublin. Moriarty was not directly criticized in the Murphy Report, but was a member of the Dublin archdiocese leadership for more than a decade before it put proper protections for children in place, he said.

Editor's Note: This story corrects a story posted earlier to reflect that allegations involved people other than clergy.

OTTAWA, Canada -- Bishop Paul-Andre Durocher of Alexandria-Cornwall, Ontario, apologized for the clergy sexual abuse in his diocese and urged remaining survivors to come forward.

His public statement came as the Cornwall Inquiry, which looked into the response of public institutions to decades of sexual abuse allegations that first became public in 1992, was released at a Dec. 15 news conference.

Led by Normand Glaude, an Ontario court justice, the four-year inquiry offers more than 200 recommendations for public agencies and the church on dealing with abuse cases.

"We know that there were some appalling occasions a few decades ago when people in authority, including priests, sexually abused young people," Bishop Durocher told reporters. "I have had the occasion a number of times to listen first hand to the painful stories of survivors of sexual abuse and have been shaken by their testimony.

DUBLIN, Ireland -- The Irish bishops have apologized as a group for clerical abuse of children and agreed to work with the government to set up a mechanism to ensure that abuse allegations are properly handled.

The bishops suspended normal business at their winter general meeting in Maynooth to consider the findings of a special commission investigating the handling of clerical abuse in the Archdiocese of Dublin. That report, published Nov. 26, described a "scale and depravity of abuse" that "deeply shocked" the bishops, they said in their statement, issued Dec. 9.

DUBLIN, Ireland -- Ireland's Sisters of Mercy have pledged to contribute an additional 128 million euros ($191 million) to compensate victims of abuse in government schools and orphanages run by the order.

That equals the amount that 18 religious orders -- including the Sisters of Mercy -- agreed to pay under terms of a 2002 deal with the Irish government.