Back in the day when Undaunted’s voice was beginning to break, one of his first columns was an open letter to the then Cardinal Brady. You can read it here.

I actually used the phrase ‘avoid scandal for the church’. The really frightening thing is the good cardinal used the same excuse yesterday when he was giving evidence in Derry to the Historical Abuse Enquiry. These were different times, I was a younger man.  Who would have thought asking the victims if they liked what Smyth did to him was wrong.

The horror of Smyth’s savagery was brought home on the Pat Kenny Show when Pat interviewed Loreto. In a feat of bravery, She dropped her right to anonymity and went through the depravity she had to endure at the hands of Smyth. You can hear what she said here.

The part where she describes Cardinal Brady addressing the victims in a church galled me. It’s ALL ABOUT HIM. He is the ‘wounded healer’ looking for forgiveness. It is the language of the Church rather than the language of a human being who knows he has done wrong.

Wounded healers? Who is he kidding? I have a far better term. Accessory to a crime or how about perverting the course of justice? By shielding Smyth, this is exactly what the church did.

I’m trying to find a good analogy and the only ones I can think of come from post war Germany and the Nuremburg Trials. Yes, this is dangerous, but the ‘I was only following orders’ defence didn’t wash then and Cardinal Brady should know it does not work now. No amount of theological fudge or soft focus language can obscure this.

The man is culpable.