Their view: Diocese program deserves a chance, but it does merit scrutiny too

Times Leader
January 26, 2019

https://bit.ly/2sQ2LZK

What to make of the Diocese of Scranton’s new “Independent Survivors Compensation Program”?

On the face of it, ignoring past actions both within this diocese and throughout the United States Catholic hierarchy, and ignoring outside pressures for stronger action in the long-standing sex abuse scandal that has plagued the Church, this feels right.

It makes sense to hire an outside group to administer a compensation program. It’s laudable and logical that the program is open to all victims, whether victimized by a priest of the diocese proper (there is an important distinction between a diocesan priest and priest practicing within the diocese), as well as by someone from a religious order or a lay employee of the diocese.

The program includes the critical caveat that even victims who have not yet reported past abuses can participate after reporting abuse in writing to a District Attorney’s Office.

It’s essential, for integrity of the system, that the diocese promised not to use any parish or school assets, any contributions and bequests from parishioners, and any donations to the Diocesan Annual Appeal to pay compensations required by the outside agency handling the program. The promise to use existing diocesan assets and reserves, and to sell additional assets or borrow money if necessary, makes it clear the diocese takes the onus of it all, not the faithful still putting envelopes into weekly collection baskets.

All of this and other components of the program sound like the right thing to do, but:

• This diocese and others are deeply tainted from past inaction and half-steps over the decades, including the policy of sending abusive priests for “treatment” at outside facilities and then putting them back in service, deemed sufficiently mediated, if not cured. Critics are too quick to latch onto those days as proof the Church simply hid it all — It is very believable that bishops genuinely thought they were doing the right thing because they were told it was so, and that society at large had yet to fully come to understand the problem they faced. But if poor judgment or ignorance adopted flawed “best practices” before, it can happen now.

• Setting a deadline of July 22 this year for victims who have not yet come forward to report to a DA feels arbitrary at best, self-serving at worst. Some limit is reasonable, but the cases already known have shown it can take years, even decades for victims to feel healed enough to speak. Perhaps setting reporting deadlines to date of incident or age of victim at the time would make more sense.

• While the program is voluntary, agreeing to participate does mean waiving rights to future litigation, according to the website set up by the diocese (scrantondioceseiscp.com). There is an inevitable fear that this is as much an attempt to prevent legislators from changing the statute of limitations on such cases as it is to genuinely help the victims, a sort of “Look, we cleaned it up ourselves, no reason for outside action” move. The program’s independent administrators and the diocese must work hard to prove that theory false, and legislators must not take the program as proof it need not consider further changes in child sex-abuse laws.

What to make of the new program? It deserves time to unfold, scrutiny as it does so, and at least some benefit of the doubt. But ultimately what matters is what the program makes of itself.