Perry has now spent 136 days in jail – for stepping up to the plate to protect children, and then daring to say he has lost faith in the justice system. This is the institutional response to allegations of childhood sexual abuse.
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Hearings resume at 0930 hours (9:30 am) this morning (Thursday 03 July 2008). Father Denis Vaillancourt will resume his testimony. He will be followed by Father Kevin Maloney.
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The “public” in the Cornwall Public Inquiry is about to take another beating and yet again be forced to the back seat of the bus.
David Sheriff Scott (the Diocese and Bishop Emeritus Eugene Larocque) is jumping up and down howling “prejudicial” because Dallas Lee (the Victims Group) wants to put the names of 19 individuals to Father Denis Vaillancourt. Lee wants to simply put the names to Vaillancourt one at a time and ask if the priest was ever approached with allegations about that individual, or if the diocese ever received allegations against the individual ,or if he, Vaillancourt heard any stories about the individual.
Citizens for Community Renewal is, along with most I believe in the Weave Shed, siding with the diocese. Only Frank Horn (the Coalition for action) is backing Lee.
Justice Glaude seems to favour keeping the names secret and the public in the dark. He is taken by a compromise suggestion that the 19 names be listed on a sheet of paper and put to Vaillancourt in that format. None but the chosen in the Weave Shed would be privy to the names.
“Arguments”/discussions on this one wrapped up with a decision as to the way ahead in the morning. Unless things change radically overnight the names will be kept secret. Lee noted that the names have been known and talked in Cornwall for years, but, looks like secrecy will win the day yet again and the public at this “public” inquiry will be left in the dark. Lee seemed to be leaning toward the compromise of compiling a secret list – as long as the list is entered into evidence.
I do believe and fear that this is a taste of things to come with diocesan witnesses.
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I don’t know if I should call it outright lying, or fibbing, or perjury or failed memory syndrome.
Yesterday Father Vaillancourt essentially testified he never told the group of victims, parents and supporters who met with him at the diocesan centre in 2002 that sex abuse is really no big deal when the victims are post-pubescent.
He said it!
I was there. I heard him. So did others who were there. So did the mother of an “alleged”victim of Leduc who broke down in tears and sobbed her heart out when she heard that from a Roman Catholic priest. Her son had “allegedly” been repeatedly molested in his teens by Jacques Leduc.
I remember.
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Several other observations and bits of information re Father Vaillancourt’s testimony:
(1) Vaillancourt admitted being a friend of Leduc’s;
(2) Vaillancourt knew Nelson Barque – they were at Saint Paul University together for a spell. I understood Vaillanourt to say Barque was with an order and therefore not living in seminary with him. According to other sources Vaillancourt went through his seminary studies without spending any time living in seminary. Did I misunderstand?;
(3) Vaillancourt testified he knew nothing of the close relationship between Father Gilles Deslaurier. and Bishop Adolphe Proulx. Quite amazing given that it was the talk of Cornwall and beyond;
(4) After all these years Vaillancourt still seems to know little or nothing of the horrific impact same-sex sexual abuse has on young males. He readily demeans David Silmser for not describing his “alleged” sex abuse by Father Charlie in minute detail during a meeting with Vaillancourt, Jacques Leduc and Msgr. McDougald!;
(5) Vaillancourt, a canon lawyer, denies ever reading a word of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishop’s 1992 guidelines on sexual abuse, From Pain to Hope. I am truly amazed.
(6) Under cross examination the impression was conveyed that because there were no diocesan policies in place in Alexandria-Cornwall in the mid 80s no one quite knew how to deal with the sex abuse allegations against Father Gilles Deslaurier!
They needed a policy to know right from wrong?! Roman Catholic clergy needed a written policy to know right from wrong?
Since when did Roman Catholic priests need diocesan policies to recognize immorality and sinful behaviour? Since when did a Roman Catholic priest need diocesan policies to know that a priest who preys on and sexually abuses young boys isn’t fit for the priesthood?
This is too too much!!!
Deslaurier’s victims were all male. Shortly after the Second Vatican Council the Church issued Persona Humana (Declaration on Certain Questions Concerning Sexual Ethics, 29 December 1975). (The relevant text can be found here)
Since when did Roman Catholic clergy need a diocesan policy to know that if the Church teaches that homosexual acts are “intrinsically disordered” and can in no way be approved that that teaching is applicable to clergy and that such acts in and of themselves are at the very least sinful? And since when did a Roman Catholic priest need a diocesan policy to know that if a priest seduces and/or coerces young boys to engage in such acts the priest’s actions are sinful, scandalous, perverted, reprehensible and criminal?
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Justice Glaude has denied the Cornwall Police Service motion to excuse Sgt. Ron Lefebvre: “I have not been provided sufficient information to grant this motion.”
No date for further arguments was set. Where it goes from here is anyone’s guess.
And that truly is enough for now,
Sylvia
Re: Vaillancourt testimony that post pubescent abuse is no big deal contrary to the distinct memory of Sylvia and others. I believe Sylvia and Vaillancourt is lying. The garbage is not on this site but in the testimony at the Weave Shed. These things happen because the clergy really believes that it is no big deal. They act throughout like it is no big deal. It is entirely believable that he would say something like that and entirely believable that he would lie about it. A question: Did Vaillancourt make sure there were no recordings made of that meeting? Vaillancourt and these courts are averse to having recordings because it gives them less scope to lie. Public proceedings such as these should all be recorded and encapsulated in a podcast with the sound and the transcript all in one convenient file. The technology is readily available for this and it should be used. The courts are already making the transcripts and they could make podcasts just as easily. This would open up the proceedings to people when the feed is down, and also to those who cannot be at their computers when the court is in session. If you really want the truth – use podcasts for every public proceeding. Anything else is akin to a cover up in this day and age.