Michael Ledwith
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dr. Michael Ledwith (also spelt Miceal Ledwith), a native of County Wexford, Republic of Ireland, is an author and teacher at Ramtha's School of Enlightenment, Yelm, Washington, which describes itself "as a school of ancient wisdom". He was a Catholic priest of the Wexford Ireland Diocese of Ferns from 1967 to 2005.
He was a member the senior staff of St Patrick's College, Maynooth, County Kildare, Republic of Ireland for 16 years holding posts of Lecturer in Theology, Registrar, Dean of Theology and Vice President before becoming President in 1985 until he resigned in 1994 following allegations of improper sexual contact with a minor.
St. Patrick's is the national (and only remaining) seminary for the education of men to the Roman Catholic priesthood in Ireland and has 65 registered students in 2006. Its trustees are drawn from bishops of the Catholic Hierarchy in Ireland.
Ledwith was enthusiastically nominated to be President of St. Patrick's by the then Bishop of Ferns, Dr. Brendan Comiskey despite allegations being made against him a year earlier by six seminarians at the College each of whom had concerns about his elaborate and worldly lifestyle and suggestions that Ledwith had a homosexual orientation. Three of these seminarians are now Catholic priests.
Comiskey resigned as Bishop of Ferns in April 2002 after a BBC television documentary, Sueing The Pope, disclosed the previous month that Comiskey failed to tell parishioners in his Diocese that Fr. Seán Fortune, a priest of the Diocese of Ferns was a brutal, predatory paedophile. Fortune committed suicide in March 1999 at his home in New Ross while on bail on child sexual abuse charges.
Ledwith, for many years was the cherished darling of the Irish bishops. He was appointed during the tenure of Tomás Cardinal O'Fiaich Primate of All Ireland and Archbishop of Armagh and strongly supported by his successor, Cahal Cardinal Daly. Daly appointed Ledwith Monsignor.
Ledwith also became Chairman of the Committee of the Heads of Irish Universities and a member, from 1980 to 1997, of the distinguished International Theological Commission, which set up by the Vatican in 1969 to advise the Pope on theological matters. Ledwith resigned prematurely in 1994 as President, and agreed a financial settlement - without liability -with a man who alleged Ledwith had abused him as a minor. Daly's successor, Dr. Seán Brady, the current Archbishop of Armagh, oversaw the process that led to the laicisation of Ledwith eleven years after he abandoned Catholicism as The Ferns Report was about to be published.
[edit] The Ferns Inquiry
The Ferns Inquiry, was established by the Irish Government in 2003 and chaired by retired Justice of the Irish Supreme Court, Francis D. Murphy. It identified over 100 allegations of child sexual abuse between 1962 and 2002 against 21 priests under the aegis of the Diocese of Ferns.
The Inquiry included a review of information concerning allegations of sexual abuse made by seminarians against Michael Ledwith when he was Vice President of Maynooth College - allegations which the bishops of Ireland claimed to be wholly unaware of; an ignorance that was maintained despite the sacking of the former senior Dean at Maynooth, Very Rev. Dr. Gerard McGinnity, after he attempted to advise them of the seminarians concerns in 1983.
