How the world’s media reported Taoiseach Enda Kenny’s attack on the Vatican's response to child abuse allegations in the Cloyne diocese.
The Guardian - "What makes the verbal sortie on the Vatican so groundbreaking is that it is a Fine Gael taoiseach, whose political base lies in the conservative west of Ireland, who has led from the front."
Daily Mail - The astonishing attack was the first time that Ireland's Parliament has publicly castigated the Vatican instead of local church leaders during the country's 17 years of paedophile-priest scandals.
The Spectator - "At long last a senior politician, responding in this instance to the Cloyne report into clerical child abuse in that diocese and the church's willingness to cover that abuse up, has stood up to the habitual denial, obstructionism and duplicity of the church in these matters.
BBC News Online - "An unprecedented attack on the Catholic Church"
Deutsche Welle - Ireland's premier Enda Kenny has issued a stinging attack on the Vatican, accusing Rome of putting its own interests ahead of victims of child sexual abuse.
Al-Jazeera - Kenny criticised the role of the Vatican over allegations that the Catholic church covered up child abuse by its priests.
The Australian - Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny launched a blistering attack on the Vatican...his hard-hitting comments came in a parliamentary debate
New York Times - The rare denunciation of the Holy See's influence in this predominantly Catholic country came just a week after the government issued a report accusing the Vatican of sabotaging Irish bishops' 1996 decision to begin reporting suspected cases of child abuse to the police.
CNN - 'Ireland's prime minister launched a stinging attack on the Vatican"
TIME - "In a direct challenge to the Vatican, Kenny denounced what he called "the dysfunction, disconnection, elitism - and the narcissism - that dominate the culture of the Vatican to this day."
And the reaction on Twitter....
@cairotango "I'm still in shock. If he actually means what he says then Enda Kenny has more backbone than any Taoiseach before him."
@evaduffy "Ireland cuts the Vatican umbilical cord"
@gombeenpolitics "Wow! A Taoiseach with the balls to stand up to the Catholic Church"
@barryhennesssy "Taoiseach Enda Kenny really socked it to the Catholic Chuch"
@mkellyirishcath "Enda Kenny's speech to the Dail on Cloyne, while making some good points, is filled with bizarre rhetoric"
@lileeny Enda Kenny, Ireland's Wendi Deng
@spatouttweets Its what our leaders should have been saying for years