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US Catholic Bishops, under Fire, Meet to Consider Proposals to Police Themselves

By Michelle Boorstein and Julie Zauzmer
Washington Post
June 11, 2019

https://www.lmtonline.com/news/article/US-Catholic-bishops-under-fire-meet-to-consider-13967544.php

Facing double-barreled criticism of their handling of clergy sexual abuse and church finances, America's Catholic bishops began their annual spring meeting Tuesday vowing to codify for the first time rules to hold themselves accountable for misconduct.

The strong possibility that the U.S. Church will vote this week to create a system of bishop oversight is historic, though critics and watchdogs remain worried about a possible weakness: In the measures under consideration, all future probes will remain in-house. Lay people can be involved but it's not mandatory, and the pope retains full power over whether to keep or how to punish bishops.

"This week we continue a journey that will not end until there is not one instance of abuse in our church," Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said in opening the meeting Tuesday morning.

The past year has seen church leaders - especially in the Northeast - enmeshed in scandals involving cardinals and bishops accused of engaging in sexual harassment and financial abuse, or looking the other way when their fellow, high-ranking peers did so. Just last week, The Washington Post reported that a Baltimore archbishop investigating sexual and financial misconduct by a West Virginia bishop edited out part of the investigative report that included the archbishop himself.

 

 

 

 

 




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