Suffer the Children

The Telegram
February 12, 2016

http://www.thetelegram.com/Opinion/Editorials/2016-02-12/article-4433407/Suffer-the-children/1

One step forward, two steps back.

Child sexual abuse by the clergy is not a problem that Pope Francis created, but it is one he promised to address.

It’s a shame then that not everyone in the church seems to be getting the message.

Tuesday, Britain’s Guardian newspaper reported on details that had been discovered by Cruxnow.com’s John Allen about a training manual for Catholic bishops — most importantly, about how they should handle the discovery of child sexual abuse by clergy.

And the manual is anything but heartening.

In fact, it says that it’s “not necessarily” the job of bishops to inform police of the abuse of children.

“According to the state of civil laws of each country where reporting is obligatory, it is not necessarily the duty of the bishop to report suspects to authorities, the police or state prosecutors in the moment when they are made aware of crimes or sinful deeds,” the training document states.

Instead, the guide argues that the onus is on abused children or their parents to contact authorities, and that the church’s involvement begins when the police are called.

That’s not how you solve the problem, and all you have to do to realize that is to look at the legacy of clergy abuse against children in this province. Using that standard, virtually all of the abuse that continued in this province — when priests were moved to new parishes or moved out of parishes where problems arose, only to have the same abuse problems arise in new locations — could have unfolded exactly the way it did decades ago.

It is the responsibility of any person with authority to report suspicions of abuse of children to the proper channels.

In fact, in Newfoundland and Labrador, it is the law, even for bishops:?that’s expressly spelled out in this province’s Children and Youth Care and Protection Act.

The act includes “a teacher, educational psychologist, guidance counsellor, school principal, social worker, family counsellor, member of the clergy or religious leader, operator or employee of a child care service, a youth worker and a recreation worker” and provides for penalties including fines up to $10,000 and six months in prison.

It’s also not how Pope Francis’ special commission, the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, appears to view the necessity of reporting offence. A representative for that commission told Cruxnow.com that reporting offences to authorities was viewed as a “moral obligation, whether the civil law requires it or not.”

Certainly, the Vatican is a big ship, and not one that necessarily turns on a dime. The establishment of the church is arguably top-heavy with older men inculcated with antiquated views on how to deal with sexual abuse, and fully changing those views may not be easy.

The problem is that child sexual abuse by clergy has been front-page news for more than three decades in Newfoundland and Labrador alone. The ship should be well turned by now.

Hopefully, if a bishop in Newfoundland followed those training guidelines, while he might not get a complaint from his superiors, he would be criminally charged by more earthly authorities.