Victims Seek “real Reform” from Diocese

SNAP
September 10, 2015

http://www.snapnetwork.org/ne_victims_seek_real_reform_from_diocese

For more than a dozen years, Lincoln Catholic officials have violated the weak, vague and ineffective US church abuse policy. So it’s hard to get excited that Bishop James Conley is belatedly complying with one part of that policy.

[catholicnewsagency.com]

If Conley really wants to protect kids, he’ll do what 30 of his colleagues have grudgingly and belatedly done: post names of proven, admitted and credibly accused child molesting clerics on church websites. He’ll visit each parish where a predator priest worked, begging victims, witnesses and whistleblowers to call law enforcement. He’ll turn over every single document he has about these predators to police and prosecutors.

He’ll scour priests’ personnel files and demote or discipline every cleric who concealed crimes or suspected crimes by another cleric. He’ll join with victims in advocating, not opposing, better secular child safety laws.

Today’s move is a tiny and ineffective one, designed, we suspect, to generate positive public relations more than to make a real difference.