Irish cardinal ducks responsibility for abuse cover-up

Cardinal Sean Brady, who leads Ireland's four million Catholics said will not not resign despite accusations levelled by a BBC documentary that he had helped in a cover-up of child abuse committed in the 1970 by a pedophile priest who continued to assault scores of children for several decades, according to an AP story.

Cardinal Brady said the BBC has exaggerated his role in his interviews of two teenage boys in 1975 abused by Brendan Smyth. He said he gave his report to his bishop, who was to inform the leaders of Smyth's religious order. Apparently deflecting responsibility, the cardinal said that it was they, not himself, who had the power to act and failed to do so. "I feel betrayed that those who had the authority in the church to stop Brendan Smyth failed to act on the evidence I gave them. However, I also accept that I was part of an unhelpful culture of deference and silence in society, and the church, which thankfully is now a thing of the past," Brady said.

The cardinal did not address why nobody in the church thought to call the police or civil authorities. Also, he did not mention that, as a canon lawyer in the two interviews, he required both teens to sign oaths of secrecy promising not to tell anyone outside the Catholic Church of the abuse they had suffered. Cardinal Brady has also argued that the oaths were designed to protect the rights of the children, not the reputation of the Church.