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<H5 style="CLEAR: both" class=details><A class=quiet
href="http://www.spokesman.com/2010/aug/12/">August 12, 2010</A> in <A
href="http://www.spokesman.com/nation-world/">Nation/World</A></H5>
<H1>World in brief: Vatican rejects resignations</H1>
<DIV class="details nested grid-4"><SPAN><STRONG
style="MARGIN-RIGHT: 3px"></STRONG>The Spokesman-Review
</SPAN></DIV></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>
<P>Dublin, Ireland – Pope Benedict XVI has rejected the resignations of two
Irish bishops who came under heavy pressure to step down in the wake of a
damning report on clerical sex abuse in Dublin, Irish media reports
said Wednesday. </P>
<P>Auxiliary bishops Raymond Field and Eamonn Walsh tendered their resignations
in December after a government-backed investigation found evidence of widespread
cover-ups involving cases of priestly abuse in the Dublin Archdiocese from the
1970s through the 1990s. The report caused an uproar in Ireland and deepened
public disillusion with the once-dominant Roman Catholic Church.</P>
<P>But in a letter seen by Irish news outlets, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin
informed fellow clerics that the Vatican had decided not to accept the two
bishops’ offers to step down. Instead, the pair would be “assigned revised
responsibilities within the diocese,” the letter said.</P>
<P>The Vatican’s decision was swiftly denounced by victims’ groups as further
proof that the church is more interested in protecting its own than atoning for
past sins.</P></FONT></DIV>
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