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Part of today’s report on the Vatican by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child.

Recommending a new investigation into the Magdalene Laundries.

Mark Kelly, Director of the  Irish Council For Civil Liberties (ICCL) writes:

“This is a devastating critique of systemic child protection failures by the Vatican which continue to have a profound effect on many people in Ireland. The report zeros in on some of the most egregious forms of abuse committed in this State under the ultimate authority of the Vatican. In the light of these unprecedented findings, the ICCL is calling upon the Pope’s diplomatic representative in Ireland, Archbishop Charles John Brown, Papal Nuncio and Dean of the Diplomatic Corps to provide a detailed account of the action that will be taken in this State to ensure that these shortcomings are rectified”

Pope’s Ambassador Should Give Answers on UN Vatican Abuse Report (ICCL)

Earlier: The Damned

Previously: The McAleese Report: A Conclusion

Thanks Walter Jayawardene

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[Members of Trinity College Students’ Union and others outside the Russian embassy in Orwell Road, Rathgar, Dublin this morning]

Ahead of Sochi.

Leanna Byrne writes:

Today’s demonstration was to show our continuing solidarity with the Russian LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer) community in concurrence with the college-wide ban of Coca-Cola and Procter & Gamble products. The decision to continue to protest against the Winter Olympics was made by Students’ Union Council in response to Russia’s ongoing violations of Human Rights Law and persecution of LGBTQ people.

Peviously: “Leave The Children In Peace”

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[ The National Emergency Coordination Group Briefing this afternoon. Top from left: Liam Basquille (office of Public Works) , Brian Kenny and Sean Hogan, Dept of the Enviroment, and Met Eireann’s Ger Fleming]

The Government has defended the decision of the National Emergency Coordination Group not to hold until yesterday its first plenary meeting in response to the adverse weather and flooding of the last month.
Fianna Fáil social protection spokesman Willie O’Dea said this morning that he was “gobsmacked” that the group had not met until this month. He was responding to an interview given by the group’s chair Sean Hogan this morning in which he disclosed its first formal meeting had been held yesterday.

Decision not to convene national emergency group defended (Harry McGee, Irish Times)

(Sam Boal/Photocall Ireland)

(Top Judi Dench as Philomena Lee and Steve Coogan as Martin Sixsmith, Bill Donohue of the Catholic League)

Bill Donohue of the Catholic League offers his version of Philomena Lee’s life story of Catholic Ireland of the 1950s.

It should also attract attention for what it really is: a cruel caricature of nuns that is based on half truths and out and out lies. That it appeals to the worst appetite in anti-Catholic bigots is not debatable.

The film smears the Irish Catholic Church much the way “The Magdalene Sisters” did. That tale of woe was clearly discredited with the release of the McAleese Report last year, a study authorized by the Irish government.

Just as we would not expect a Palestinian-made movie of Israel to be fair, Irish Catholics do not expect that a film crafted by the English to ring true.

The Weinstein boys, Harvey and Bob, are the perfect duo to distribute the movie in the U.S.Their previous gifts to Catholicism include the film, “Priest,” a tale of five morally debased priests; a flick that stars Sinead O’Connor as a foul-mouthed Virgin Mary, “Butcher Boy”; one that features a descendant of Mary and Joseph who works in an abortion clinic, “Dogma”; a movie that ridicules Catholics about sex, “40 Days and 40 Nights”; a big screen portrayal of vicious nuns, “The Magdalene Sisters”; a depiction of Santa as a vulgar, drunken, sexual predator, “Bad Santa” ; and “Black Christmas,” a dark comedy made especially for the holidays.

But as we shall see, the nuns never “took” the baby, and never sold him.

Hardcore.

Read in full here. (162 kB PDF)

Previously: Laundering The Magdalene ‘Myths’

Broadsheet Trailer Park: Philomena

Identities Withheld

Philomena’s Oath

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