Vatican guilty of unholy compassion for paedophiles

the post.ie ^ | 20 December 2009 | Vincent Browne

[Alex Murphy]

In 1922, the Vatican promulgated an instruction to do with what it called crimen solicitationis (the crime of solicitation within the confessional) and what it called the ‘‘worst crime’’ - the sexual abuse of children. The document was issued in Latin. No authoritative version was produced in English.

The document was circulated only to bishops and under terms of strict secrecy.

A new version of the guidelines was produced in 1962, but this, according to the Murphy Commission, was unknown within the Dublin diocese until some time in the 1990s.

Desmond Connell, the former archbishop, told the commission he had never seen the 1962 document, nor had he met anyone who had seen it.

John Dolan, the chancellor of the diocese and a monsignor, whose job is to ensure that the administrative records of the diocese are kept safe, said he didn’t know that ‘‘lurking in the very end, at the very back [of the decree crimen solicitationis], was a little paragraph on the ‘‘worst crime’’.

He was unaware of the 1962 document until an Australian bishop discovered towards the end of the 1990s that it was still valid. Until then, he did not know of any guidelines by the Vatican on the issue of clerical child sexual abuse.

The Murphy Commission commented on how ‘‘unusual’’ it was, ‘‘whereby a document setting out the procedure for dealing with clerical child sexual abuse was in existence but virtually no one knew about it or used it’’.

In 1996, victims of clerical abuse hounded the bishops into devising a ‘framework document’, setting out guidelines for dealing with allegations of abuse. John Dolan said: ‘‘They [the authors of the framework document] did not feel Rome was supporting them in dealing with this issue ... they were meeting an onslaught of complaints, and Rome was pulling any particular solid ground that they had from under them’’.

The 1922 and 1962 Vatican instructions on dealing with allegations of clerical child sex abuse demanded absolute secrecy in the conduct of investigations. T he secrecy was so pervasive that, to some, it seemed to demand that the complaint also be kept secret from the state authorities.

Cannon 1341 states that the bishop is to ‘‘start a judicial administrative procedure, for the imposition or the declaration of penalties, only when he perceives that neither by fraternal correction nor reproof, nor by any methods of pastoral care, can the scandal be sufficiently repaired, justice restored, and the offender reformed’’.

The Murphy Commission notes: ‘‘This canon was interpreted to mean that bishops are required to attempt to reform the abusers in the first place." In Dublin, efforts were made to reform abusing priests by sending them to therapeutic centres. But, according to the commission, ‘‘the archdiocese seems to have been reluctant to go beyond the reform process, even when it was abundantly clear that the reform process had failed’’.

But, more tellingly, the commission stated they ‘‘could find very little evidence, particularly in the early decades of the commission’s remit, of any attempt by church authorities to restore justice to the victims’’.

I t says the question of harm to the victims never seemed to have been considered by the archdiocese.

In considering whether a person is guilty of the ‘‘worst crime’’, canon law states a person must have ‘‘deliberately’’ violated the canon law. In considering the issue of guilt under canon law, the Canon Law Society of Britain and Ireland has commented: ‘‘Among the factors which may seriously diminish their imputability (guilt) in such cases (cases of clerical child sexual abuse) is paedophilia ...

‘‘Those who have studied this matter in detail have concluded that proven paedophiles are often subjected to urges and impulses which are in effect beyond their control .. .because of the influence of paedophilia (the abuser) may not be liable, by reason of at least diminished immutability (guilt) to any canonical penalty or perhaps to only a mild penalty, to a formal warning or reproof or to a penal remedy."

The commission says it ‘‘finds it a matter of grave concern that, under canon law, a serial child abuser might receive more favourable treatment from the archdiocese or from Rome, by reason of the fact that he was diagnosed as a paedophile’’.

What all this says is that the issue is not just a matter of negligence or complicity in clerical child sexual abuse on the part of individual bishops - it is the culture of the Catholic Church, a culture shaped by the church authorities in Rome and transmitted and refined in dioceses.

A culture that hides the Church’s own guidelines concerning what it itself rhetorically said was the ‘‘worst crime’’; that caused the Vatican authorities to pull the ground from priests who were trying to draft guidelines on abuse; that prioritises the abusers over the abused; that has been essentially indifferent to the harm caused to abuse victims; that regards paedophiles as objects of sympathy and compassion.

A few more episcopal resignations, with a presumption that these settle the matter, is just a continuance of the culture of denial of the Catholic Church’s institutional and cultural complicity in the criminality of clerical child sexual abuse.

The Holy Roman and Apostolic Church is the problem.

[Alex Murphy]

The Murphy Commission notes: ‘‘This canon [Canon 1341] was interpreted to mean that bishops are required to attempt to reform the abusers in the first place." In Dublin, efforts were made to reform abusing priests by sending them to therapeutic centres. But, according to the commission, ‘‘the archdiocese seems to have been reluctant to go beyond the reform process, even when it was abundantly clear that the reform process had failed’’.

But, more tellingly, the commission stated they ‘‘could find very little evidence, particularly in the early decades of the commission’s remit, of any attempt by church authorities to restore justice to the victims’’.

It says the question of harm to the victims never seemed to have been considered by the archdiocese.

[vladimir998]

Oh, look another article about pedophilia posted by Alex.

Imagine that.

[Darkwolf377]

I've never seen this publication posted here, so I went to check it out. Here's another article from the same source that clues you in as to where they're coming from:

The winner of the Post Mortem Outstanding Achievement of the Decade Award is: the great ape (or whatever animal immediately precedes humans on the evolutionary path). The apes win because they haven’t destroyed the planet. The apes win because they don’t spend huge amounts of money trying to find newer, nastier ways of killing each other. The apes win because they don’t spend insane amounts of money on nuclear weapons, instead of giving it to very poor apes. The apes win because half of their population isn’t obese, while the other starves to death. The apes win because half of their population doesn’t suffer from floods, while the other half has barely any water. The apes win because they don’t spend more money on entertainment than they do on drugs that might alleviate the suffering of fellow apes. The apes win because they don’t fly planes into buildings full of other apes. The apes win because they don’t invade other ape nations on the most spurious of grounds. The apes win because they aren’t constantly waging war on other ape nations over ape land, ape oil or ape religion. The apes win because they don’t form organised religions in which children are sexually abused by members of the religion while other senior members don..."

Go to the site to read the rest if you want. Puts this report, which I've not seen anywhere else, in context. (The apes win because they don't suffer from floods? Huh?)

[MarkBsnr]

Cannon 1341 states that the bishop is to ‘‘start a judicial administrative procedure, for the imposition or the declaration of penalties, only when he perceives that neither by fraternal correction nor reproof, nor by any methods of pastoral care, can the scandal be sufficiently repaired, justice restored, and the offender reformed’’.

I looked up Cannon 1341 on Google. This is the first page of results:

http://www.i4es.org/resumes/KFucikResume.pdf

http://www.lawyersdirections.com/oregon/cannon-beach/619334-101-press-inc.html

http://www.satobs.org/seesat/Sep-2003/0155.html

http://www.satobs.org/seesat/Sep-2003/0155.html

http://www.stateoforegon.com/directory.php?name=&city=Cannon+Beach&form=biz

http://www.justice.gov/usao/iln/pr/chicago/2008/pr0811_01d.pdf

http://209.157.64.201/focus/f-religion/2411895/posts(link to this thread)

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Canon_EOS_3_img_1341.jpg

http://openjurist.org/280/f3d/1341

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1341 (an article about the year 1341).

Sorry, Alex. I can't find any references to Cannon 1341 that back up your claim. Do you have any more?

[Alex Murphy]

Sorry, Alex. I can't find any references to Cannon 1341 that back up your claim.

Sorry Mark, but it wasn't my claim. Still, somehow I was able to find the exact quote at the "Our Lady's Warriors" webpage. Here's the quote from the thread:

‘‘start a judicial administrative procedure, for the imposition or the declaration of penalties, only when he perceives that neither by fraternal correction nor reproof, nor by any methods of pastoral care, can the scandal be sufficiently repaired, justice restored, and the offender reformed’’.

And here's the quote from Our Lady's Warriors [matching sections are bolded]:

TITLE V: THE APPLICATION OF PENALTIES

Can. 1341 The Ordinary is to start a judicial or an administrative procedure for the imposition or the declaration of penalties only when he perceives that neither by fraternal correction or reproof, nor by any methods of pastoral care, can the scandal be sufficiently repaired, justice restored and the offender reformed.

Perhaps your search was thrown by the misspelling of the word "canon" in the article.

[Poe White Trash]

The source of the commentary by Vincent Browne is "ThePost.IE," which is "The Sunday Business Post Online."

This is from their "About Us" page:

ThePost.ie is a new portal site from The Sunday Business Post that has been designed as a gateway to the internet for those with in interest in Irish business, financial, political and economic issues.

ThePost.ie is partnering with Irish businesses that have a strong online offering to deliver a fuller, faster internet service to our growing online community.

ThePost.ie follows the principles and philosophy of The Sunday Business Post.

http://www.thepost.ie/post/pages/p/flat.aspx-qqqincludename=aboutus.htm-qqqx=1.asp

This doesn't appear to be a fringe publication.

[Poe White Trash]

Being a “cannon” lawyer must be tough on the ears, don’t you think?

[MarkBsnr]

Got it, thanks. http://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20090320_1.htm says that:

“Penal remedies in the 1983 Code

The 1983 Code of Canon Law reflects many of the insights of the Second Vatican Council, and particularly its emphasis on human dignity and rights. The Code Revision Commission sought to limit penal law to the external forum, abolished a series of vindictive and expiatory penalties, gave greater emphasis to the principle of mercy, and emphasised pastoral considerations (such that punitive measures did not damage the wider interests of the faithful) in the administration of sanctions.

The Code gives the reasons for sanctions: reform of the offender, restoration of justice, and the reparation of scandal (canon 1341). Several means for achieving the objectives are outlined in canon 1341, apart from the ‘correction’ and ‘repute’ mentioned in canon 1339.”

I guess I’m still puzzled as the claim of secrecy in the thread article and how it is claimed that it was hidden from clergy and the people.

[Alex Murphy]

I guess I’m still puzzled as the claim of secrecy in the thread article and how it is claimed that it was hidden from clergy and the people.

The article makes reference to four documents. The first is mentioned in the opening sentences:

In 1922, the Vatican promulgated an instruction to do with what it called crimen solicitationis (the crime of solicitation within the confessional) and what it called the ‘‘worst crime’’ - the sexual abuse of children. The document was issued in Latin. No authoritative version was produced in English. The document was circulated only to bishops and under terms of strict secrecy.

The second comes next in the article It is this document that is apparently cited in the Murphy Report:

A new version of the guidelines was produced in 1962, but this, according to the Murphy Commission, was unknown within the Dublin diocese until some time in the 1990s....The Murphy Commission commented on how ‘‘unusual’’ it was, ‘‘whereby a document setting out the procedure for dealing with clerical child sexual abuse was in existence but virtually no one knew about it or used it’’.

The third is one drafted by the Irish bishops themselves:

In 1996, victims of clerical abuse hounded the bishops into devising a ‘framework document’, setting out guidelines for dealing with allegations of abuse. John Dolan said: ‘‘They [the authors of the framework document] did not feel Rome was supporting them in dealing with this issue ... they were meeting an onslaught of complaints, and Rome was pulling any particular solid ground that they had from under them’’.

It's at this juncture that the fourth document - the previously debated Canon 1341 comes in - and the article gives no introduction to it, unlike the prior three. The article makes two sudden changes, first talking about the bishops' "framework document", then the 1922/1962 document, and then the Canon, without indicating why the latter is being raised.

The 1922 and 1962 Vatican instructions on dealing with allegations of clerical child sex abuse demanded absolute secrecy in the conduct of investigations. T he secrecy was so pervasive that, to some, it seemed to demand that the complaint also be kept secret from the state authorities.

Cannon 1341 states that the bishop is to ‘‘start a judicial administrative procedure, for the imposition or the declaration of penalties, only when he perceives that neither by fraternal correction nor reproof, nor by any methods of pastoral care, can the scandal be sufficiently repaired, justice restored, and the offender reformed’’.

It would be easy for the reader to confuse the Canon with the 1922/1962 documents are as being a single work, from the way the article treats them. Presumably Canon 1341 is raised because it was either cited in the 1922/1962 document(s), or in the Murphy Report as being connected to the 1922/1962 document, or in the bishop's framework document.

[magisterium]

I suspect it might be the 1917 Code, which preceded the one currently in force. The canon numbers, and subject order, would be different.

Still, it’s pretty cheesy stuff for you to be bringing up, Alex. Got any of this stuff highlighting Protestant ministers? How about public school teachers? No? Somehow, I didn’t think so, though that stuff is certainly not at all hard to find on the web.

[MarkBsnr]

I didn't find any good references to 1922, but I was able to find: Crimen sollicitationis (Latin for "the crime of soliciting") was a letter sent in 1962 by Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani, Secretary of the Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office, to "all Patriarchs, Archbishops, Bishops and other Local Ordinaries, including those of Eastern Rite". In the document, the Holy Office laid down procedures to be followed in dealing with cases of clerics (priests or bishops) of the Roman Catholic Church accused of having used the sacrament of Penance to make sexual advances to penitents; its rules were more specific than the generic ones in the Code of Canon Law.[2] In addition, it instructed that the same procedures be used when dealing with denunciations of homosexual, paedophile or zoophile behaviour by clerics. It repeated the rule that any Catholic who failed for over a month to denounce a priest who had made such advances in connection with confession was automatically excommunicated and could be absolved only after actually denouncing the priest or at least promising seriously to do so.[3] A revision of the document, in line with the 1983 Code of Canon Law (which had replaced the 1917 Code that was in force in 1962) and the 1990 Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches, was issued in 2001 in the form of the Instruction De delictis gravioribus. An English translation of this 2001 Instruction appeared on Origins, 31:32 (24 January 2001).

All Patriarchs, Archbishops, Bishops and other Local Ordinaries, including those of Eastern Rite. Somebody's falsifying something here. Either the author of the article or the Dublin diocese.

Purpose of the secrecy

The document dealt exclusively with the procedure to be followed in connection with a denunciation to the ecclesiastical authority of a priest guilty of solicitation in Confession or of similar acts. It imposed secrecy about the conduct of the ecclesiastical trial, not allowing, for instance, statements made during the trial by witnesses or by the accused to be published. But it did not in any way impose silence on those who were victims of the priest's conduct or who had learned of it in ways unconnected with the ecclesiastical trial.

"These matters are confidential only to the procedures within the Church, but do not preclude in any way for these matters to be brought to civil authorities for proper legal adjudication. The Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People of June, 2002, approved by the Vatican, requires that credible allegations of sexual abuse of children be reported to legal authorities."[5]

Some interpret the secrecy about the procedure as a cover-up of scandalous conduct. This view was presented in a BBC documentary film Sex Crimes and the Vatican.[6] of 1 October 2006.

Others see it as aimed rather at the protection of all involved, the accused, the victim/denouncer and the witnesses, before the verdict was passed: "It allows witnesses to speak freely, accused priests to protect their good name until guilt is established, and victims to come forward who don’t want publicity. Such secrecy is also not unique to sex abuse. It applies, for example, to the appointment of bishops."[7]

A presentation of the question can be read in a study [8] of 1 November 2006 by Thomas Doyle, OP, JCD.

Notice here, that there is no order of secrecy on the victims and that there was an established method for reporting to the secular authorities. I guess that I am still puzzled by the 1922 report, and the air of secrecy from all. The diocese was given the 1962 report, of that I have no doubt. Somebody is lying and if it is the bishop, then hell would be too good for him.

[MarkBsnr]

Got any of this stuff highlighting Protestant ministers? How about public school teachers?

I kinda agree; but here's the point. We have to have a clean house first. We are sinners, yet we have to be able to handle the sins and ensure that they are not institutionalized. We want no Jimmy Swaggarts or Ted Haggards in the Church.

[magisterium]

Agreed. I only wanted to point-out the single-minded expose of Catholics here, as if only Catholics have this problem. That we need to have our own house in swept and in order is a given. Recent measures undertaken by the Church - even if in an often tardy fashion - are meant to find true and just remedies for the sins of the past.

That some folks seem to want to dredge up nothing but muck, when remedial measures are more and more in operation, says more about them than the Church scandal they so eagerly want to keep in the headlines.

[Alex Murphy]

I only wanted to point-out the single-minded expose of Catholics here, as if only Catholics have this problem.

The only thing "single minded" is the near-monolithic absense of threads posted by Catholics about abuses within the Catholic Church (or within public schools). If FReepers looked at nothing but threads posted by Catholics, they'd be hard-pressed to believe that anyone but Protestants have had any problems at all in this area.

[Poe White Trash]

We want no Jimmy Swaggarts or Ted Haggards in the Church.

Jimmy Swaggart and Ted Haggard?

If it had only been a matter of RC priests in Ireland soliciting adult prostitutes and taking illegal drugs, I doubt there would have been something like a Murphy Commission as a response.

What Swaggart and Haggard did was immoral and reprehensible. What the Murphy Commission report claims occurred in Ireland is at least an order of magnitude worse.

[Darkwolf377]

Never heard of it today. Being an internet site associated with a business paper doesn’t make it any less fringe—countless papers simply have connections to online content producers. Did you read that other article I posted a selection from? That doesn’t suggest an agenda beyond reporting business news? They also post fiction, something I’ve yet to see in business journals.

[narses]

Oh, look another article about pedophilia posted by Alex.

Imagine that.

[Iscool]

Well maybe you have to spell it correctly...3rd one down...1st page...

http://books.google.com/books?id=JKgZEjvB5cEC&pg=PA1558&lpg=PA1558&dq=Canon+1341&source=bl&ots=GI7HLJxz-f&sig=N7pmFl3-k654-T4sEwe50oOpVWI&hl=en&ei=LiUvS7_lAoaKNuHBtY4J&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CAwQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=Canon%201341&f=false

[Iscool]

Still, it’s pretty cheesy stuff for you to be bringing up, Alex. Got any of this stuff highlighting Protestant ministers? How about public school teachers? No? Somehow, I didn’t think so, though that stuff is certainly not at all hard to find on the web.

It's not about school teachers...And it's not about priests...It's about the One True Church setting up a mechanism to protect child molestors from their victims as well as to protect them from the law...

But then you have to ask yourself why a religion would want this perverted, illegal activity within it's ranks protected...

[Poe White Trash]

I never heard of it, or of the journalist Vincent Browne, until Alex Murphy posted the article.

I read the article you excerpted from. Looks like it was meant to be satire; if so, the spirit of Swift isn't doing too well in Ireland!

As for there being an agenda beyond reporting news, how is that different from any other newspaper you've come across?

And it's obvious that Vincent Browne's op-ed isn't intended as fiction. BTW, I looked up "Vincent Browne" on the internet and he seems like an Irish journalist who doesn't have any particularly sinister connections (except perhaps for the fact that he's a barrister!).