The High Court’s decision this week to allow 341 former Christian Brothers to be served by newspaper advertisement is a highly unusual remedy for an outrageous refusal of responsibility. A man abused as a child at a Christian Brothers school in Kilkenny in the 1970s can now progress his claim for damages only by publishing the names of hundreds of men, none of them accused of any wrongdoing, and warning them that judgment may follow if they do not appear.Judge Mary Rose Gearty granted the order because there was no other way for the case to progress. She also said, correctly, that while the congregation’s leader has no legal obligation to nominate a representative, she found it almost unbelievable that an organisation calling itself the Christian Brothers did not consider that a moral obligation, and that the decision was morally extraordinary.Like most religious congregations, the Christian Brothers is an unincorporated association, meaning there is no single entity that can be sued. The remedy for this is simple. The order nominates someone to stand as defendant on behalf of all members. Almost every other congregation does this without fuss. The Christian Brothers refuse. The effect is that a survivor must identify and serve every man who was a member when the abuse occurred, a process so slow, costly and distressing that Circuit Court president Keenan Johnson called it morally bankrupt, designed to protect assets and wear claimants down through attrition. The Law Reform Commission, led by former chief justice Frank Clarke, has said the law should be changed to stop orders using this technicality to deter and delay survivors.These are not complex or subtle ethical questions. A congregation with net assets worth around € 44 million and hundreds of properties across the State has arranged its affairs so the burden of accountability falls on elderly claimants and on innocent former members. The victim, meanwhile, loses the anonymity he would normally keep because the notice bears his name.The strongest indictment comes from the Brothers themselves. In 1998 the congregation apologised openly and unreservedly, addressing directly those who had complained of abuse and were not listened to. The provincial who issued that apology, Edmund Garvey, is the man who initiated the strategy of refusing to nominate, a strategy his successor continues. The contrast between public contrition and legal manoeuvering is stark.Other congregations have chosen differently, accepting the discomfort of standing as defendants rather than hiding behind a technicality. The Christian Brothers should now do the same. It is the last chance to rescue something from a reputation the order’s own choices have left in tatters.