In the United States, a federal judge in Kentucky ruled that the Holy See is a foreign state that enjoys certain immunity protections. In the judge’s opinion these included protection for the Vatican against any claims arising from sexual abuse litigation. Another ruled in December 2005, that Pope Benedict XVI enjoys immunity as a head of state and removed him from a civil lawsuit accusing him of conspiracy to cover up sexual abuse by a seminarian.

The Vatican, that for centuries has told people on pain of eternal damnation how they should lead their sexual lives, now demands that the clerical abuses revealed over the last 30 years, should be forgiven and forgotten.

This collection of work is a window on the legacy. The incurable virus of self-loathing, guilt, fear and hatred; the damage from this seeping contaminate is amplified many-fold not only by the source of its origins, but by the secret society which has systematically covered it up for hundreds of years.

Statistics researched for this collection need not be listed. To numerate suffering does nothing to consider its horror.

If a God is all you have and that God’s vessel on earth is behind a secret society which only recently regards the actions of a percentage of its members as a ‘crime’ as well as a ‘sin’ - then the desolation of the aftermath is for all eternity.

Artist's note:
The framing here is to imply reclaimed wood from church pews. The austere look invokes the feeling in a bleak house of worship. It is a reminder to be humble in the face of greatness and power.

The natural linen canvas used has echoes of the sack cloth used in retreat or at times of penance and self-reflection; the discomfort of such material an irritant and reminder of who is in charge.

The use of gold peeled gold leaf is the decaying state of the Catholic Church in face of all the revelations coming to light in past years.

The scarlet paint it there as blood – the blood of Christ and the blood on the hands of the guilty. A stain that can never be erased or washed away.