The case against a priest accused of indecently assaulting a student in a school toilet on an unknown date in the mid-1980s has been dismissed after a trial at Cork District Court.

The number of priests formally accused of sexually abusing children in the country’s biggest Catholic diocese over the past 40 years has topped 100, according to the latest figures.

The Catholic Church's counselling service, Towards Healing, has extended its opening hours today and tomorrow, in response to the publication of investigations into nine dioceses and religious congregations.

The child protection watchdog in the Catholic Church has said the fact that a priest was convicted of abusing a child this year shows the Church needs to remain vigilant on abuse.

Many priests who admit to or who are found guilty of child sex abuse also have addictions, feel isolated or unfulfilled, while others are narcissistic or worryingly needy, according to the Church’s child protection watchdog.

I am writing in reply to Andrew Fagan (March 18), one of the 69 salaried lay officials of the Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, who seeks to reprimand and silence me for writing about the departure of Ian Elliott from the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church (NBSCCC).

In your Letters to the Editor section (March 14) a Fr. Thomas O’Flynn, in writing about the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church, claimed “there are other uninvestigated clerical scandals with adolescents that occurred at other locations around the country.”

I write in connection with Mr Ian Elliott’s sad experience as the chief executive for six years with the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church, as recently reported in several newspapers.

The case against a priest accused of indecently assaulting a student in a school toilet on an unknown date in the mid-1980s was put back for more evidence on the complaint to be supplied to the defence.

Concerns about a priest who was serial paedophile were not passed on to senior diocesan figures or to the authorities in the north west despite being known at a early stage.

The Catholic Church’s child safety watchdog has said it may never know the number of victims of clerical sex abuse where priests could have been taken out of circulation earlier to prevent further harm.

Fourteen allegations of abuse have surfaced in the Diocese of Down and Connor since 2008.

A total of 67 allegations of child sexual abuse against 21 Kerry diocesan priests have been made since 1975, but only one priest has been convicted, according to the Review of Safeguarding Practice in the diocese.

An audit by the Catholic Church’s child protection watchdog has found worrying disparities between dioceses in the way they deal with allegations of sexual abuse. The audit by the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church includes a series of reports on dioceses across the island.

A priest facing several sex abuse allegations asked to be dismissed and went on to work in a job which gave him access to children, the church watchdog has found.

The Christian Brothers have said that "they deeply regret" the hurt caused by their response to abuse allegations which resulted in only 12 brothers being convicted of crimes in the past 38 years.

An audit of how the Christian Brothers dealt with abuse allegations has found only 12 brothers were convicted of crimes between 1975 and today.

A number of reports on child abuse in the Catholic Church will be published this morning.

A woman who was abused for 10 years in the diocese of Clogher said he latest report from the Church’s child protection watchdog illustrates “how unsupportive” Bishop Joseph Duffy was to clerical abuse victims.

A retired Catholic bishop has admitted mistakes after a watchdog found opportunities to stop dangerous paedophile priests were consistently missed.

People clinging to Catholic beliefs by their fingernails have been told to look to Bono for hope.

“A clean pair of hands” is how the retired bishop of Derry, Dr Edward Daly, summed up Monsignor Eamon Martin, the future head of the Catholic Church in Ireland — a reference to the fact that the young prelate isn’t tainted by the abuse scandals and is a valued director of the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church in Ireland.

A Dublin-born theologian, named yesterday by Pope Benedict as the next Bishop of Limerick, said he prayed at “this delicate time” that politicians would be inspired to know how best to protect the lives of mothers and their unborn children.

The Association of Catholic Priests has called for changes to be made to the guidelines on standing aside priests accused of abuse from ministry.

The Church’s child protection watchdog has warned the Government to urgently update data protection laws so gardaí can fully inform bishops and child protection workers in the Church about abuse allegations made directly to the Garda Síochána.

There has been some progress but more is needed to ensure the safeguarding of children, writes Maeve Lewis

A long-serving bishop has sparked a storm of controversy over his fitness for the job after revealing he once thought paedophilia was “friendship gone too far”.

An abuser from within the Dominican Friars played a role in national initiatives of the Catholic Church to improve responses to child abuse.

Serial abusers from the Spiritan order worked in schools across Ireland with unmonitored access to children throughout the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s.

Three priests convicted of child abuse in the UK retired to the diocese of Cork and Ross, according to the Catholic Church’s child protection watchdog.

Children’s Minister Frances Fitzgerald said the seven child protection reports were “horrific” and “shocking”, with child protection being ignored in some instances up until last year.

Five priests in the Diocese of Limerick, who were cleared by gardaí of child sexual abuse allegations, have been refused permission to return to ministry, according to the audit carried out by the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church (NBSCCC).

A long-serving bishop has sparked a storm of controversy over his fitness for the job after revealing he used to think paedophilia was friendship gone too far.

Barnardos chief executive Fergus Finlay has described as "a childish excuse" comments from Bishop of Clonfert John Kirby that he previously regarded paedophilia as a "friendship that crossed a boundary line".

Ian Elliot, the head of the Catholic Church's own watchdog on child protection measures, has detailed the policies now in place to prevent child abuse.

The Bishop of Clonfert has today apologised for moving two priests from one parish to another in the 1990s after they abused children.

Proposed legislation on mandatory reporting of child sex abuse will “materially weaken” child safety policies in the Catholic Church, the institution’s abuse watchdog has warned.

Proposed legislation on mandatory reporting of child sex abuse will “materially weaken” child safety policies in the Catholic Church, the institution’s clerical abuse watchdog has warned.

A total of 237 new abuse allegations were reported to the National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church (NBSCCC) in the year to the end of March.

The HSE investigation into alleged sexual and physical abuse at a former north Cork boarding school is still under way but the HSE cannot say when its conclusions will be made public.

The minister for Social Protection is the latest in a line of politicians who have questioned Cardinal Seán Brady’s role at the top of the Catholic Church in Ireland.

Cloyne Diocesan Safeguarding Children Committee (CDSCC) rejects the assertion in the Irish Examiner (Mar 28) that our recently launched Safeguarding Children Newsletter “is an attempt by the diocese to improve its damaged reputation…”

Religious groups are taken aback by the apostolic visitation recommendation that “the religious in Ireland consider developing a collaborative ministerial outreach to those suffering from the effects of abuse”.

The apostolic visitation report strongly underlines the need for the Catholic Church to continue listening to and providing counselling services to the thousands of people abused in its care.