IT would seem that in our secular society the last acceptable prejudice is to scoff at Catholic beliefs.

CARDINAL Bernard Law celebrated Mass for Pope John Paul II in St Peter's Basilica yesterday, ignoring protests that his handling of the sex abuse scandal in the US Catholic Church should disqualify him from the honour.

A small but symbolic protest staged by two victims of sex abuse at the hands of American priests was stymied today when police escorted one of them off St. Peter’s Square as she was preparing to distribute leaflets.

MORE THAN 1,200 priests in nearly every diocese in America have been accused of sexually abusing children since the Roman Catholic Church in the US became embroiled in a sex abuse scandal a year ago.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE could well have been writing about Cardinal Bernard Law when he wrote: “The evil that men do lives after them, the good is oft’ interred with their bones.”

The Chairman of the Dublin Council of Priests has spoken out in support of Cardinal Desmond Connell and rejected calls for the Cardinal's resignation.

A Catholic priest in Co Antrim has accused Cardinal Desmond Connell and other senior bishops of treating the victims of clerical child sex abuse with "wicked contempt".

CARDINAL Bernard Law said he hoped his resignation would bring "healing, reconciliation and unity" to the Boston Archdiocese, after an agonising year of revelations of sexual abuse

SURVIVORS of child abuse have renewed their calls for Cardinal Desmond Connell to step down following the resignation of Boston archbishop Bernard Law yesterday.

THE resignation of Cardinal Bernard Law brought relief, prayers and some sadness from Catholics who watched the priest sex abuse scandal mushroom over the past year.

The Irish Survivors of Child Abuse group has called on Cardinal Desmond Connell to follow the example of his US counterpart, Bernard Law, and resign.

Victims of clerical sex abuse in Ireland have said the Catholic Church needs to offer more than resignations in dealing with the problem of child abuse.

Cardinal Bernard Law, under intense fire in the paedophile priests' scandal that has rocked the Roman Catholic church in the US, today resigned as Boston’s archbishop.

The most senior Roman Catholic prelate in the US was today expected to meet the Pope at the Vatican amid speculation that he will resign over a priest sex abuse scandal threatening to bankrupt his archdiocese.

BELEAGUERED Boston Cardinal Bernard Law and more than five bishops have been ordered to appear before a grand jury which is investigating church officials who supervised priests accused of paedophilia.

EMBATTLED Cardinal Bernard Law met with Vatican officials again yesterday, a day after the Boston Archdiocese released more personnel records on sexually abusive priests and 58 clerics submitted a letter calling for Cardinal Law to resign.

CARDINAL Bernard Law sought counsel at the Vatican last night, fuelling speculation he would step down over the deepening sex abuse scandal in Boston.

Whether it has been the growth of organised crime, the drug culture, or the breakdown in social values here in recent years, there was a preview of what was to come in the United States.

FACING rekindled outrage from parishioners and some priests over new revelations of clergy misconduct, Cardinal Bernard Law stayed away from Boston’s Cathedral of the Holy Cross yesterday as protesters renewed calls for his resignation.

THOUSANDS of newly released personnel files show that the Archdiocese of Boston went to great lengths to hide priests accused of abuse, including clergy who allegedly snorted cocaine and had sex with girls aspiring to be nuns.

Some advocates for sex abuse victims have said Pope John Paul II’s first public comments in Canada on priests who molest children sent the wrong message: that the Roman Catholic Church cares more about clergy than those who were abused.

BOSTON Cardinal Bernard Law, head of the Roman Catholic archdiocese at the centre of a national child sex scandal afflicting the Church, faced a new round of questioning yesterday over his handling of priests accused of molesting children.

US Catholic Church today began the holiest week of its year with its leading cleric promising to get tough on child-abusing priests.