Catholic Church in Ireland reports record number of historic abuse allegations
June 11, 2025
The National Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church in Ireland received a record 385 allegations in 2024-25, according to its newly released annual report (p. 10).
New allegations “rose to 385 in 2024/25 from 252 in 2023/24,” said Aidan Gordon, the national board’s CEO. “This represents an increase of over 50% in the number of new allegations notified and is the highest number of any reporting period since we began publishing the figures annually in 2009.”
The board stated:
As has been the pattern in recent years the vast majority of the allegations relate to the period from 1960 to 1989. 282 of the 385, or 73%, are in this category. Only 2, or less than 0.5%, relate to the period post-2000. This should be caveated with the fact that 47, or 12%, did not have a definite timeframe attributed to them.
88% of allegations (338 out of 385) were lodged against members of religious institutes.
“The majority of allegations received (291) state sexual abuse as the major abuse; there were a further 55 allegations of physical abuse, 4 boundary violation, 1 neglect, 1 emotional, 1 bullying and 32 cases of alleged abuse for which the type was not provided,” the report stated (p. 12).
Of the 334 accused members of religious institutes, 308 are male. 221 are deceased, 31 are in prison, and five are in active ministry. Of the 39 accused diocesan clergy, 20 are deceased and one is in active ministry (p. 14).
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