Catholic bishops told to follow own policies against abuse
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Amid continuing headlines about cover-ups of child abuse in the Catholic Church, an oversight board of lay Catholics on Wednesday (June 13) warned the nation’s bishops that they must follow their own policies against abuse more rigorously if they hope to restore their fragile credibility.
“If there is anything that needs to be disclosed in a diocese, it needs to be disclosed now,” Al J. Notzon III, head of the bishops’ National Review Board, told some 200 prelates gathered in Atlanta for their annual spring meeting. “No one can no longer claim they didn’t know.”
The meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops comes 10 years after the hierarchy met in Dallas and passed a series of reforms to respond to a siege of bad publicity about sex abuse by priests. It also comes as a jury in Philadelphia weighs the fate of a high-ranking priest who’s facing criminal charges of concealing abuse by clerics, and as a bishop from Missouri awaits trial on charges that he failed to report a suspected child molester to authorities.
In his review of the church’s track record over the past decade, Notzon did not mention the Philadelphia or Missouri cases by name, nor any of the other periodic lapses by bishops over the 10 years since the USCCB passed the so-called Dallas Charter.
While the charter called for punishing priests with a one-strike policy and instituted programs to safeguard children in Catholic parishes and schools, it did not provide any mechanism for disciplining bishops who flout the charter’s provisions. [more]
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23 Comments
Margaret…we are not the judge. But, Catholic doctrine teaches we are responsible for the protection and defense of the faithful. We are also responsible for investigating heretics and those who do grave harm to the Church. The unfaithful just close their eyes and pretend thousands have not been raped on every continent of the globe. It is against Catholic teaching to remain silent in the face of violence. It is not ok to take MASS rape of the children of the Church as a matter to be left in God’s judgement. That is heresy. We are called to act, protect and defend the TRUE Church…no Christian is a Christian who turns a blind eye.Silence is consent.
But Maryann — you just judged me! See your post to me below. It is really creepy when a highly judgmental person such as yourself accuses me of the very thing of which you are demonstrably guilty.
Jim…your creepy comments are far from charitable….far from Christlike.If I recognize comments such as yours they usually come from abusers. Hi Recovering…please join Catholics Against Abuse And Cover Up on facebook.
MaryAnn — you’re not judging me, are you? Of course you are. That is not very Christ-like. And, to imply that I might be an abuser — wow, Maryann, that is emotional abuse of me — not very Christ-like, and not very charitable.
And honestly, Maryann, not only is your comment uncharitable and judgmental, but it is clearly unfair. This is like playing the race card or the misogynyst card — it tends to stop things in their tracks. Your comment, Maryann, was below the belt and thus abusive.
And, on further reflection, Maryann, one final thought: your comment was hostilely manipulative.
Hey Jim, can you just cut the crap and stop already with the “are you judging me?” and comment on the issue at hand and allow others to, and stop badgering them.
I was born and raise in the catholic church. I attended 12 yrs of Catholic school during a time I considered to be abuse of power from nuns, and priets. Fortunately, all of them were not abusive, but it did take me awhile to recover. I am Catholic today, after walking away several times due to my own intolerance. but God took the beating for my intolerance. Now, God is all that is important to me, and the rest of these people are flawed humans, we will all be judged for our actions, but we are not the judge.
Thanks, Margaret; indeed, we all are flawed humans. And, as Jesus told us after He gave us the Lord’s Prayer, if we do not forgive those who have hurt us, our Father in Heaven will not forgive us. I am glad that, by the grace of God, you have overcome your understandable aversion to the negative experiences you have had, and are fully back in the Church.
I hope and pray that these Bishops take to heart the warning by the oversight Board of lay-Catholics presentation to them, and that this wasn’t just for show? They have lost their credibility as Bishops and Shepards. So many priests, religious and lay-people tolerate them as they individually live the gospel so apart from dependence on their Bishops approval. As a Priest said of them, “You can live with them and sadly, you can live without them.” It would be so refreshing for me to start to see Bishops acting like servants and not as Kings with gold rings and gold chains. I wonder if any of these Bishops ever red the life of Francis of Assisi or John Vianney?
You are quite confused, Recovering. You hate the Church, have no faith in it, yet are posting on a Catholic website. Why don’t you go find an atheist website on which to post? They very likely are much more compassionate than us Catholics, and I’m sure would listen compassionately to you. If you’ve been abused, go see a good Christian therapist, and forgive those who have hurt you. I’m tired of your garbage.
Oh come on – why are you worried about the abuse of children by priests – there is a much bigger problem to be addressed – all those nuns who will not bow to the male dominated leadership in our Church.
Wow, what a sexist comment, David. I can see you’ve been brainwashed by the anti-women’s movement of the late 20th century. Men were created by God to be the leaders — so how about, as a man, if you quit ducking your responsibility to lead, and quit dumping it on the women, who, as these nuns clearly demonstrate, are not equipped by God for leadership.
Jim, I think I could see David’s tongue firmly planted into his cheek.
Also, Jim, we also need to keep focused on this article’s issue and not let David’s remark move us from it. You know probably more that anyone who has posted that there are _numerous_ articles in this website in which to post comments about that
Carlos — since I know you are a man after God’s own heart, I will consider what you say. However, this consistent negativity toward males has got to go — so, maybe you be the good cop, and I’ll be the bad cop. I can’t stand these folks who are so angry, then want everyone else to be as miserable as them. Until they understand that Jesus intentionally selected only men for leadership positions, I don’t know that we can ever convince people like Recovering.
You may recall that even Jesus advised His apostles to be gentle as doves, but wise as serpents; also, He told them to shake the dust off their sandals and move onto the next town if a certain town was not receptive to being evangelized. I wonder if Jesus would suggest we shake Recovering’s dust from our sandals.
I’m not sure. The Church has called for a re-evangelization of its own people. The person who needs our love and support more than any other are the ones who have left active participation in the Church and are now attempting to come back but see obstacles in the way of that path. The only type of news that we see about the Catholic Church right now is almost all negative. Nevermind all the positive things that we do.
Carlos — here’s the question: what is love? If I stop my friend from driving drunk, and we get into an argument, doesn’t that represent love? Pope Benedict XVI said that love is not greeting card sentimentality. I think the Church has been feminized; the evidence? Who do you see more of in church, men or women? People like Recovering may simply need to have some cold water thrown in their face to wake them up. People like Recovering may give no credibility to “nice” Christians.
The bishops need to listen to Christ who warned us to clean our own house before we try to clean the house of another. The laity demands and deserves full transparency from these guys.
The church has known about these problems since at least 177 A.D. when Bishop Athenagoros addressed the problem and said that these abusers should be excommunicated. There were also councils that addressed the sexual abuse problem (Council of Elvira in 305; council of Ancrya in 314); the Penitential of Bede; the Book of Gomorrah in 1051 (composed by St. Peter Damian); the Decree of Gratian in 1140; the papal decree “Horrendum” in 1568, all to no avail. You can’t allow the inmates to run the asylum. Then, the church, concerned only with protecting its “image,” created the “secret system” of coverups and moving priests around rather than dealing with the problem to protect the laity from them. Does anyone think that after 1,835 years of lies, deceit and secrecy about this problem, they will solve it now and save the church?
So Recovering, I’m curious now — who is responsible for how miserable you are? Is it the Church? Or is it you? “God grant me the ability to change the things I can, the ability to accept the things I can’t, and the wisdom to know the difference.” The garbage, hatred, vitriol you spew is nauseating — you need some help, and you’re not going to get adequate help on this website. Go find yourself a competent, Christian therapist.
Hi, Recovering.
I am happy to see that you are attempting to fully place yourself back into our faith family but have issues. I haven’t met any recovering Catholic who doesn’t.
Have you written your bishop’s office regarding this issue? Your well-read argument can be presented to him and chances are he will listen. If you notice, there are a relative tiny percentage of few priests who are hurting the vast majority of the ones who have stuck to their vows and love of the children of God.
By no means am I attempting to make excuses for them. I personally think that _if_ they are proven to have done these heinous crimes that they should be laicized and prosecuted. After all, non-priests who do this are prosecuted as well.
I offer you may thoughts and prayers as you continue the faith journey upon which God has you.