MASSACHUSETTS
Boston Globe
Editorial
POPE FRANCIS sounds genuinely contrite for the sexual abuse of minors by Catholic clergy, and he has promised that those responsible will be called to account . Yet as an institution, the church still seems stuck in the habit of protecting clergy members from secular criminal justice systems.
In certain ways, the church has been moving more swiftly than usual in response to the troubling case of the Vatican’s former ambassador to the Dominican Republic, Jozef Wesolowski, who was accused of sexually molesting boys in the island nation. When the accusations reached the Vatican in August of 2013, Wesolowski was quickly yet quietly recalled to Rome, and a church tribunal defrocked him in June of this year. Wesolowski became the highest-ranking Vatican official ever to be found guilty of sex abuse under canon law.
Even so, he apparently remained a free man; he has been seen strolling around Rome, according to a troubling New York Times report in August. The newspaper detailed the allegations of sexual crimes by Wesolowski in the Dominican Republic, where he arrived as nuncio in 2008; his young victims say Wesolowski paid them for sexual favors. Aggravating the situation, it seemed that the 66-year-old former nuncio had retained his diplomatic immunity even after being defrocked. That is, until the Vatican eventually released a statement saying Wesolowski did not have that protection anymore.
Then, late last month, the church announced Wesolowski’s arrest as a separate Vatican criminal court held a hearing on his case. Beyond charges of sexual abuse, he was also accused of having child pornography. If found guilty — after Pope Francis’ revision of the Vatican law regarding sexual abuse in 2013, Wesolowski can be sentenced to up to 12 years in prison — the former ambassador would be the highest-ranking church official to be convicted. And it would be only the second major case in recent memory, after Paolo Gabriele, Pope Benedict’s former butler, was sent to Vatican prison on charges of aggravated theft.
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