Yet He Opened Not His Mouth

The lead counsel to the UK's independent inquiry on child sexual abuse has upbraided the Vatican for its continuing refusal to co-operate. Even after decades of scandal, the approach of Mussolini's holy city remains the same, namely to sit tight, do as little as can be got away with (or, when it comes to protecting the abusers, as much as can be got away with) and wait for it all to go away. In extremis the Holy See will snap out a peremptory complaint about the indignities to which a sovereign state should not be subjected: a nation whose citizenry consists entirely of officially celibate males with an invisible friend does not understand why its own domestic laws should come under scrutiny just because child abuse happens to be frowned upon in real countries. Still, it is encouraging to note that God's henchman in Westminster, whose response to the scandal in the Irish church ten years ago was to praise the abusers for their courage, discovered last February that the victims' point of view was not altogether incomprehensible, and found it quite a sobering experience.