Vatican Toughens Rules on Abuse Cases, by Stacy Meichtry, Wall Street Journal, July 16, 2010

Vatican Toughens Rules on Abuse Cases

By Stacy Meichtry
Wall Street Journal
July 16, 2010

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704682604575368612000147250.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

VATICAN CITY—The Vatican tightened its rules for disciplining cases of alleged sexual abuse, marking the first time it has changed church laws to address the sexual-abuse scandal that has opened Pope Benedict XVI to widespread scrutiny over his handling of abuse cases.

The new measures didn't quell accusations that Vatican policies have fostered coverups of sexual abuse by those within church ranks.

Officials inside the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican's office in charge of disciplining abusive priests, also are weighing whether to issue additional guidelines advising bishops on best practices in reporting alleged cases to civil authorities and taking measures to prevent abuse, according to people familiar with the matter.

A draft of those guidelines is months away from completion and might never be approved, one of the people said, and the Vatican is unlikely to make such guidelines binding, because church officials are concerned that forcing bishops world-wide to report all allegations could lead to false accusations in countries where the Catholic Church is subject to

The measures unveiled Thursday revise rules originally decreed by the late Pope John Paul II in 2001. The revision doubles the statute of limitations for sex-abuse allegations to 20 years from a victim's 18th birthday, drops requirements that clerics act as judges in church trials, and allows the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith to dispense with time-consuming church trials and defrock abusive priests with the stroke of a pen.

The possession of child pornography and the abuse of mentally impaired adults were added to a list of crimes covered under the revised rules, which the Vatican said were approved by Pope Benedict on May 21.

The Vatican also added to the list of crimes deemed punishable by excommunication the attempt by a cleric to ordain a woman, a move criticized by women's rights groups.

The Vatican prefaced the revisions with a "historical introduction" to sex-abuse policies. The overview didn't clarify how the Vatican handled specific cases or how many cases there had been. Thousands of priests have been disciplined under Pope John Paul II's 2001 decree. Little is known about how cases were handled before then.

Groups representing victims of abuse said the revisions fell far short of the deep overhaul needed to address a crisis that has rippled across the world this year. The global scale of the crisis has exposed a contradiction between dioceses in the U.S.— where bishops overhauled regulations in 2002 to require church officials to immediately report abuse to authorities—and the rest of the world, where many priests accused of abuse continue to work in parishes.

The change "furthers our strong resolve to do all that is possible to see that children are protected and safe, especially in the Church," said Bishop Blase Cupich of Rapid City, S.D., chairman of the U.S. Bishops' Committee on Protection of Children and Young People.

The revisions don't require bishops world-wide to report sexual abuse to civil authorities. Victims' groups say Vatican laws, which call for church officials to comply with civil laws, aren't tough enough to protect children, because many countries don't have laws that require the reporting of sex abuse.

"This is a puny response when measuring it against the vastness and chaos of this scandal," said Kristine Ward, chairwoman of the National Survivor Advocates Coalition, a sex-abuse victims' advocacy group based in Dayton, Ohio.

"A priest may be removed more quickly but then released to the general population. These are not meaningful changes," said Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of U.S. advocacy group BishopAccountability.org.

"Culture, society and laws vary from one country to the next so it would be a bit of a stretch for bishops of this country to insist that everyone does what we do," Bishop Cupich said.

Cardinal William Levada, head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, said the revisions made the Vatican rules "more useful."

The Vatican's top prosecutor for sex-abuse cases, Msgr. Charles Scicluna, said the revisions were a "consolidation" of practices the Vatican adopted in 2003 to discipline abusive priests more quickly. Msgr. Scicluna described the revisions as a "signal" and "a step forward."

Father Mark Cyza, of St. Benedict's Church in Nebraska City, Neb., said he believed the Vatican was moving in the right direction but should have required that all credible allegations be reported to civil and criminal authorities outside the church, "so that justice truly can be served."

Archbishop Robert Zollitsch of Freiburg, head of the German bishops' conference, said the new rules help bring into line the church's various rules for dealing with abuse cases in different parts of the world. "The injustice of the past and the consequences for the present and future are being dealt with," he said.

The revised rules also apply to other acts the Vatican regards as grave crimes, such as heresy or throwing away the Eucharist, which Catholics believe is the body of Jesus Christ.

To this list of crimes deemed punishable by excommunication, the Vatican added the attempt by a cleric to ordain a woman. That move drew fire from women's rights groups, which accused the Vatican of equating sexual abuse with the ordination of women.

U.S. church officials scrambled to address the anger. "The church's gratitude to women cannot be stated strongly enough," said Archbishop Donald Wuerl of Washington. He backed the Vatican's opposition to the ordination of women, but added "women have had an essential role in the life of the church."

—Margherita Stancati and Stephanie Simon contributed to this article.

Write to Stacy Meichtry at stacy.meichtry@wsj.com