Sources close to the Ferns inquiry have dismissed a report that it has made findings about a "gay sex ring" in St Peter's College, Wexford as "pure speculation" and "inaccurate in every respect".
A spokeswoman for the inquiry into child sex abuse at Ferns diocese broke from a practice of not releasing information to comment briefly yesterday that anything suggesting the headline to the newspaper report "did not come from this inquiry". She would make no further comment.
The Ferns inquiry was set up to investigate how clerical child sex abuse allegations were handled by church and State agencies in the diocese. It has been at work since September 2003 and is due to hand over its report to the Department of Health and Children by early next month.
Currently it is preparing drafts of chapters for the report and has been in contact with some witnesses to ensure they are satisfied with how their evidence has been represented. To date it has not drawn any final conclusions nor can it do so until chapter contents have been agreed.
However, over recent weeks there has been a great deal of rumour and speculation in Ferns diocese as to the inquiry's findings and along the lines published in yesterday's newspaper report. These have also claimed that a State agency being investigated by the inquiry has been exonerated of suggestions that it mishandled allegations of child sex abuse in Ferns diocese.
Mr Colm O'Gorman, director of the One in Four Group, who was himself a witness before the Ferns inquiry and whose group worked closely with it in providing counselling support for witnesses, said he understood no one had yet seen a draft of the inquiry's conclusions. He also expressed surprise that such findings would name individual priests against whom allegations had been made, as suggested in yesterday's newspaper report.
That, he said, was not a focus of the inquiry which, he pointed out, was investigating the abuse of girls as well as boys in the diocese. And, while he felt the examination of the culture in any seminary might be relevant, he would be "very surprised" if findings in the report focused on either heterosexual or homosexual rings.
The inquiry was investigating paedophilia, not heterosexual or homosexual activity, and how this was dealt with by church and State agencies, he said. Such were its terms of reference.
The Ferns inquiry, under the chairmanship of Mr Justice Frank Murphy, was set up following an investigation by Mr George Birmingham SC into how allegations of paedophilia in Ferns diocese might best be inquired into by the State. He was asked to do so in April 2003 by the then minister for health, Mr Martin, following the resignation of Bishop Brendan Comiskey. That followed broadcasting of the BBC Suing the Pope programme on child sex abuse in Ferns diocese.