Taoiseach lambasts the Pope

“Kenny accuses Pope of playing down rape, torture of children,” headlines the Irish Independent. Just a week after the publication of the Cloyne report on clerical child abuse, Taoiseach Enda Kenny has launched a historic attack on the Vatican. The report, which scrutinised allegations of child abuse against 19 priests in the diocese of Cloyne, in southern Ireland, unearthed a culture of cover-up and obstruction of justice that led all the way to Rome. Speaking before the Dail (Irish parliament) Kenny said: "The rape and torture of children were downplayed or 'managed' to uphold instead, the primacy of the institution, its power, standing and 'reputation'." In what the Dublin daily describes as being “the strongest speech in his tenure as Taoiseach -- and possibly his career” he declared that the revelations “have brought the Government, Irish Catholics and the Vatican to an unprecedented juncture". With no comment forthcoming from the Vatican, the Irish Independent notes that “Mr Kenny's speech is certain to send shockwaves through the Catholic hierarchy and the Vatican. Ireland has traditionally had a subservient relationship with the Holy See.”