Punishing church trial left priest in purgatory
THE Catholic Church was a long way from alone in the child abuse scandal: children’s homes, scout groups, choirs and other churches were also affected with the worst abuse often occurring not in any outside body but within the family itself, as the outbreak of “misery memoirs” a couple of decades ago testifies. Nay, in the 1970s and 80s the Paedophile Information Exchange was even allowed to affiliate itself to the National Council for Civil Liberties in which both Harriet Harman and Patricia Hewitt, later eminent and respectable stars of the Labour Party, held positions at the time.
Looking back now one can see the problem: the issue was too often seen in terms of morality, liberty and sexual mores than as a straightforward case of child protection. Indeed, it was not until the 1990s that we even had a sexual offences register.
Horrified by the role played by its own priests (95 per cent didn’t face even allegations let alone conviction), the Church reacted by introducing a double jeopardy so that it was not enough to be acquitted by a court but the priest must then go through another trial commissioned by the Church but carried out by a secular inquisitor from bodies such as Social Services. Last week I went to the funeral of Father John McCollough, who had endured this process.
The jury brought in a very quick acquittal but then the Church imposed the second trial. I read the report and to say it was farcical was an understatement. It said that the priest had taken a photograph of a young boy and immediately I had visions of a photo of a half-naked boy secreted at the back of a drawer but it turned out to be a snap of the lad taken in school uniform for his mother! It also stated that an interest in other people’s children was a sign of paedophile inclinations, in which case, as I pointed out at the time, I and just about every single person I know must fall into this heinous category.
YET, on the basis of this crazy analysis and regardless of the jury’s swift and uncompromising verdict, John McCullough was not able to return to his full duties as a priest. He could not even preside at Mass, presumably in case the altar boys were in danger! As the years passed, a sympathetic Bishop allowed him to do a limited amount but he died heartbroken. I know another priest, currently going through the same flawed process.
There were of course other factors which affect anyone falsely accused: the first thing which comes up if you google their names is not the acquittal but the sensational coverage of the original charge. The late David Amess MP vigorously took up his case with internet giants with some eventual success.
RIP Father John McCullough, ultimately the victim not of his accuser but of the very Church that he served so faithfully.