AUSTRALIA
Courier Mail
BY PETER TRUTE AAP DECEMBER 12, 2014
THE Catholic church is not considering abandoning its requirement for priests to be celibate despite a report which acknowledges the policy may contribute to child abuse.
A REPORT from the church’s Truth Justice and Healing Council has, for the first time in Australia, drawn a link between priests’ vow of celibacy and the child abuse that has been revealed in disturbing detail before the current royal commission.
But the council’s chief executive, Francis Sullivan, says his report is not a first step to ending celibacy for priests.
“There would be a long way to go before that conversation would be had and it would be beyond our brief anyway,” Mr Sullivan told AAP.
The report touched only briefly on celibacy amid discussion of issues that have emerged before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.
One line in the 40-page document read: “Obligatory celibacy may also have contributed to abuse in some circumstances”.
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