UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter
by Joshua J. McElwee on May. 18, 2012 NCR Today
In light of historic criminal trials of church officials this year in Philadelphia and Kansas City, that’s the question many Catholics are asking.
Both trials find church administrators on the defensive for not utilizing their lay review boards, which were set up by the U.S. bishops’ in 2002, when they passed the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, and were designed to help bishops evaluate allegations of clergy sexual misconduct.
Yet, as a report in U.S. Catholic today makes clear, the Kansas City and Philadelphia cases show a key flaw: The value of the boards hinges entirely on how bishops choose to use them.
A reminder:
In Philadelphia, a grand jury report released last year (the third such governmental investigation into the archdiocese’s handling of abuse cases) found the archdiocese had left 41 priests who had been credibly accused of abuse in ministry.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.