Friday 10 December 2010

Father Gerard Hayes

The list goes on. the following is taken from a comment put up on the blog some weeks ago.
I was at St Benedicts' in the late 60s. Dom Gerard, initially headmaster of the Middle School, was notorious for his interest in little boys. Later he moved to the Senior school, where he attempted to abuse me, amongst others. I ran away, kept on running. Others weren't so quick or so lucky. Point being that everyone knew about Gerard – boys and teachers alike. But to go against him was seen as going against the Church and that was the worst sin of all. Anyway, the Abbey at the time was a hot-bed of bullying, waspish homosexuality. . .I knew at least one postulant who left because the atmosphere was so poisonous. Gerard continued his career and activities into the 70s, ending as headmaster of the Senior school. God only knows how many lives he and others like him ruined.
There's a pattern here. Horsey, Hayes, Soper and others. The abuse is widespread. The perpetrators often seem to have been made headmaster of the middle school at some point in their career. The abuse was common knowledge - to both boys and teachers. And nothing was done, because the authority of the church was behind the abusers. They were monks and priests as well as teachers. Sometimes senior monks - headmaster or even Abbot.

And the same management is still in place at the Abbey. Francis Rossiter was Abbot at the time referred to in the account above, he is Prior now.

UPDATE 10th November 2011

With regard to the above article about Father Gerard Hayes, I was repeating a comment which had been made by somebody else on the blog, and the description was clearly indicated to be a quotation, both in my introduction and my use of blockquote formatting

I accept that the original comment was very probably incorrect. Lord Carlile has not indicated in his report that he has received any allegations against Father Gerard Hayes, and I am entirely willing to concur with his conclusion.

I apologise to any of Father Gerard's colleagues or family who may have been distressed by the article.

The point I made in the article was a more general one, as follows. "The abuse was common knowledge - to both boys and teachers. And nothing was done, because the authority of the church was behind the abusers. They were monks and priests as well as teachers. Sometimes senior monks - headmaster or even Abbot."

I think that point has been entirely borne out by subsequent events and has been made in the strongest possible terms by Lord Carlile himself.

25 comments:

  1. Is Soper back from his Roman bolthole yet?

    ReplyDelete
  2. mr west...have certain commments disappeared from this blog?

    ReplyDelete
  3. If any postings have been removed I'm sure there's a very good reason and Mr West will explain why.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yes, I have deleted a small number of comments. As I have mentioned, I will delete anything which might possibly be regarded as prejudicial to the forthcoming trial of Pearce and Maestri.

    To be on the safe side, I am taking that to mean any mention of either of them by name in any context other than reporting the progress of the current legal proceedings.

    ReplyDelete
  5. But what you have most recently deleted Mr West did not concern either Pearce or Maestri. The postings related to quite different matters.

    ReplyDelete
  6. 21:03 I think you may have been imagining things.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I've not let the latest comment though moderation. The commenter accurately described a comment that had been earlier deleted. It comes within the category I described above.

    Anything similar will not be allowed through in case it is thought prejudicial to the current case. I'm going to err on the safe side and delete comments rather than run any risk of prejudicing a fair trial.

    Decisions on this will be at my sole discretion, since it is my head on the block if anonymous comments prejudice the trial.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Well, those comments have, nevertheless, been noted Mr West. They were, after all, up for several days, until someone challenged them.

    ReplyDelete
  9. It was a mistake to let those comments through, a mistake I have now corrected.

    ReplyDelete
  10. If West was at all responsible, he would check facts. Dom Gerard could not possibly have done what is claimed in the late sixties and early seventies unless he came back from the grave. As Dom Gerard died in 1960, perhaps Mr West will remove this post and stick to verified facts.

    ReplyDelete
  11. 14.03 you must be joking. If this blog was restricted to verified facts it would only run to a couple of pages. This, like many blogs is a mixture of fact, fiction and fantasy. The potential good of this blog is diminished by the fantasy and fiction which overshadows the facts,

    ReplyDelete
  12. Well you had better tell the ISI, the DfE, the Her Majesty's Court Service, Nelson, HM Prison Service, Carlile,the Ealing Safeguarding Childrens Board, that all of them are mistaken and wasting their time.

    Be quick now.

    ReplyDelete
  13. As that famous mother said: Look at my son, he's the only one in step!

    ReplyDelete
  14. .
    The above draws attention to a very worrying aspect of this blog. Mr West seems more than happy to publicise any and every attack on Ealing Abbey true or false. It also leads one to suspect that many of his informants are just not to be trusted. This willingness to believe anything that suits one's cause represents the very worst aspect of blogging.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Yes, 17:40, there seems to be an awful lot of ‘false witness’ on this blog. It may make for good copy but is, in reality, quite scurrilous.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Yes, 20.19, scurrilous indeed all these allegations of child abuse. West and his supporters are wide of the mark and should be stopped from publishing such rubbish.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Your cry for help, if that's what it is, will convince no one 21:17. In fact, it’s this kind of blind insistence that has brought Mr West and his supporters into disrepute.

    Nobody, as far as I can tell, has denied that there were serious problems, including wrongful dealings with children, at St Benedict's, but that's it. Trying to stretch these facts and/or manufacture new ones is not doing any good and may well damage the chances of proper court hearing in January. But, perhaps that’s what some of you are trying to achieve?

    Mr West's attempts to tighten up safeguarding policies, on the other hand, can only be commended. However, contributions like yours, 21:17, merely serve to weaken this excellent campaign.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Why Mr West have you not removed the above article? Or have you information that leads you to believe that Fr Gerard Hayes did not die in 1960?

    ReplyDelete
  19. Of course he didn't die. he was being protected!

    ReplyDelete
  20. Perhaps this guy's still alive, perhaps Ealing’s a house of the non-dead? Maybe, and I’ve heard rumours along these lines - reliablve rumours, they’re all vampires or zombies or aliens come to destroy us all? As we see from reading this blog, anything is possible and the possible has always so much more to offer than reality. I think Mr West and his followers are on to something really big here, something so sinister we can hardly conceive of it but under sustained pressure the awful, horrible truth will, I’m sure, eventually emerge.

    ReplyDelete
  21. *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** ***
    Oh Come, Thou Ever Blessed Western Dawn!

    Yet more Gothic horror will, come the New Year, surely materialise from the West. So far, we’ve caught a glimpse of only the tip of this particular iceberg; its vast rotten underbelly is known only to the discerning few – to those brave, wondrous souls who, in every age, come forward to expose the powers of darkness and bring about their destruction thanks to the unique radiance of their own light.

    Come New Year, come! We are being led ever closer to the Promised Land, to that Western Paradise where all is pure, flawless and from whence true enlightenment beckons. Away with perfidious lies and satanic deceit! Let us embrace the unvarnished truth and that unmitigated, blessed reality which alone can safeguard us from evil.

    May the Law of the Pure Land, the Western Paradise prevail. For ever and ever!

    ReplyDelete
  22. Oh, how uplifting! Indeed thank you Mr West, thank you a thousand times for uncovering error and pointing the way beyond.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Great post 23.13.

    Sanity, reality and reason.

    ReplyDelete
  24. Yes, 23:13 it is what it's meant to be - a perfect caricature of this blog.

    ReplyDelete
  25. 23.13 - you have alighted on the essence of this sight.

    ReplyDelete