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Posted on 06/16/2011 5:41:56 PM PDT by Dr. Eckleburg
U.S. Catholic bishops voted Thursday to approve minor changes to their child protection charter amid several new scandals over bishops who have failed to follow it, after a key advisory committee warned that without more clear, direct responses, they risked undoing their progress on the issue.
On Tuesday, the bishops' conference was urged to "speak publicly and provide clear, accurate and honest information," said the report from the National Advisory Council, a demographically representative advisory board of 45 Catholics from across the U.S.
The warning was delivered by Bishop William Skurla, the board's liaison to the bishops, at their summer meeting in Bellevue.
The council said that, "without such information and renewed zeal to stay the course, the reputation of the charter and the image of the church are at risk."
Victim advocates were far more critical.
"Dramatic reforms are needed to better protect the vulnerable and heal the wounded," the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests said.
The charter was drafted in 2002 at the height of public outrage over bishops who had failed to remove priests who had sexually abused minors.
It says no priest who has sexually abused a minor may remain in ministry, that a review board of lay experts must advise each bishop on response to accusations, that bishops must provide compassionate support to victims and provide extensive training on the detection and prevention of child sexual abuse.
It mandates outside audits of each diocese's implementation of those policies and established a National Review Board, whose members are primarily lay experts, to oversee all of this.
To give the charter teeth, the bishops arranged for the Vatican to give its rules the force of canon law.
But, it contains no penalty for bishops who failed to remove abusers or to follow the charter.
Under canon law, only the pope can discipline a bishop.
"We don't have any ability or authority to sanction anyone," said Bishop Blase Cupich, chairman of the Bishops' Committee on the Protection of Children and Young People.
In Philadelphia, Cardinal Justin Rigali is under heavy fire for mishandling accusations against dozens of priests, after a grand jury said 37 remained in ministry despite credible allegations.
A high-ranking archdiocesan official was indicted for inaction.
In Kansas City, Mo., Bishop Robert Finn failed to act on complaints from a parish school that a priest was displaying disturbing, pedophile-like behavior.
The priest was later arrested for possession of child pornography.
Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz of Lincoln, Neb., has refused to allow the audits required by the charter, with no apparent reaction from the Vatican. Notably, the bishops' committee that oversees the charter rejected more than two dozen proposed amendments from Bishop Bruskewitz, who argued that the charter isn't binding on any bishop.
The committee replied that the charter's rules were approved by the Vatican, which recently required all dioceses worldwide to adopt similar measures.
But this review of the charter was scheduled more than a year ago only to make sure it was in line with new Vatican documents, Cupich said.
There were no major proposed revisions because the charter works well in most of the nation's nearly 200 dioceses, he said.
"It is where the charter isn't followed correctly ... that we get into difficulties," he said.
The victim advocacy group BishopAccountability.org had proposed specific changes to the charter, including requiring the diocesan review boards to consider all accusations, not just those that bishops choose to forward to them, and requiring bishops to send all allegations, no matter how flimsy, to the civil authorities.
The advocacy group also wanted bishops to at least temporarily remove a priest from ministry as soon as an allegation is made, rather than wait until a preliminary investigation is completed.
At least a few bishops believe the charter is already too harsh on priest perpetrators.
Retired Archbishop Francis Hurley, emeritus of Anchorage, Alaska, said, "I have received questions from a number of people (asking) 'don't we believe in forgiveness?'"
Crude? What was crude about it?
Freep-mail me to get on or off my pro-life and Catholic List:
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Discuss? What's to discuss? Catholics are evil, wrong, and guilty; Protestants are pure, holy, perfect, and always right.
End of discussion.
If you want to have a discussion, try the weather.
Do not make sexual innuendos on Religion Forum threads.
If they want to remove a priest, with just an allegation, they should do it quietly, working on the most recent allegation, then start checking in other parishes in which he's served. He should not be publicly accused without serious evidence.
Once an allegation is made public, there is no where the priest can go to get his reputation back when the allegation proves false, or there was nothing serious about what might have happened. In many Dioceses, Bishops have turned over their Pastoral responsibility to Commissions who treat priests as guilty before any real evidence is even produced. This is the flip side of the Bishops turning blind eyes to actual abuse in the past. Both are wrong. The Bishop should never abrogate his responsibility to his priests, and should treat each situation personally, with judgement, and discretion, until such time as clear evidence of abuse is produced.
not trying to break the rules, can you point me to where the TOS are so i can avoid future violations? thank you.
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thank you.
Bump to the chief.
That's true of anyone who is accused of a crime of this nature.
Perhaps people, priests especially, should spend more time making sure their actions are above reproach.
My soul magnifies the Lord,
And my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For He has regarded the low estate of His handmaiden,
For behold, henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
For He who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is His name. And His mercy is on those who fear Him from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with His arm:
He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
He has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and exalted those of low degree.
He has filled the hungry with good things;
and the rich He has sent empty away.
He has helped His servant Israel, in remembrance of His mercy;
As He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to His posterity forever.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.
As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen
Magníficat ánima mea Dóminum,
et exsultávit spíritus meus
in Deo salvatóre meo,
quia respéxit humilitátem
ancíllæ suæ.
Ecce enim ex hoc beátam
me dicent omnes generatiónes,
quia fecit mihi magna,
qui potens est,
et sanctum nomen eius,
et misericórdia eius in progénies
et progénies timéntibus eum.
Fecit poténtiam in bráchio suo,
dispérsit supérbos mente cordis sui;
depósuit poténtes de sede
et exaltávit húmiles.
Esuriéntes implévit bonis
et dívites dimísit inánes.
Suscépit Ísrael púerum suum,
recordátus misericórdiæ,
sicut locútus est ad patres nostros,
Ábraham et sémini eius in sæcula.
Glória Patri et Fílio
et Spirítui Sancto.
Sicut erat in princípio,
et nunc et semper,
et in sæcula sæculórum.
Amen.
She became the Mother of God, in which work so many and such great good things are bestowed on her as pass man’s understanding. For on this there follows all honor, all blessedness, and her unique place in the whole of mankind, among which she has no equal, namely, that she had a child by the Father in heaven, and such a Child . . . Hence men have crowded all her glory into a single word, calling her the Mother of God . . . None can say of her nor announce to her greater things, even though he had as many tongues as the earth possesses flowers and blades of grass: the sky, stars; and the sea, grains of sand. It needs to be pondered in the heart what it means to be the Mother of God.
(Commentary on the Magnificat, 1521; in Luther’s Works, Pelikan et al, vol. 21, 326)
(That's the Catholic Church, Dr. E.)
Our Christian faith is in Jesus Christ alone.
"My grace is sufficient for thee." -- 2 Corinthians 12:9
Very sad that Rome doesn't believe that fact.
Vapid PR, Salvation. We’ve seen countless news stories that deny your assertions.
She became the Mother of God, in which work so many and such great good things are bestowed on her as pass man’s understanding. For on this there follows all honor, all blessedness, and her unique place in the whole of mankind, among which she has no equal, namely, that she had a child by the Father in heaven, and such a Child . . . Hence men have crowded all her glory into a single word, calling her the Mother of God . . . None can say of her nor announce to her greater things, even though he had as many tongues as the earth possesses flowers and blades of grass: the sky, stars; and the sea, grains of sand. It needs to be pondered in the heart what it means to be the Mother of God.
(Commentary on the Magnificat, 1521; in Luther’s Works, Pelikan et al, vol. 21, 326)
News stories have said lots of things about priests in the last few years, many of which inferred rampant abuse of children. Those stories made people assume that most priests were pedophiles and that all the Bishops were covering for men who raped children.
The TRUTH is that, even looking over the last 50 years in this country, fewer than 2% of priests were involved in any abuse, and most of that was of post-pubescent boys, so it wasn't pedophilia, it was homosexuality.
Most priests are good men, who work hard to bring Jesus to their parishoners, and care deeply for them. Those men were horribly maligned by the media in this country, and because too many Catholics have become lax in their faith, they were willing to believe the media, because they have the notion that if they read it in the paper, or hear it on the news, it must be true.
Anyone can be accused of anything, at any time, no matter how good they are.
I would not look to any modernist for Scriptural understanding, but the Catholic understanding was fully determined through the Holy Spirit as criteria for establishing the NT canon in the forth century. The Early Church bishops were certainly not modernist and they fought many heresies of their own time that made use of apocryphal Scripture. In response, the bishops removed any gospel or epistle not fully compliant with Catholic doctrine.
Anyone who accepts the NT canon must necessarily accept the criteria used to establish that canon. Any private interpretation of Scripture that conflicts with the interpretation ensconced in Sacred Tradition, is out of line with the criteria of the NT canon.
Bishops of today, whether they are misguided or not, have no authority to re-interpret Scripture in opposition to Sacred Tradition. Nobody has that authority.
And yet the OPC your cult is silent on all the pederasts it has? Well, it’s easier for a cult of 10,000 adults and pederasts to keep things hush-hush...
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