AUSTRALIA
ABC News
By Nicole Chettle
An American priest has told the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse that the Catholic Church has used canon law as an excuse for not taking action against clergy accused of molesting children.
The commission is investigating the conflict between canon and civil law, and secrecy within the Catholic Church hierarchy.
Father Thomas Doyle, a canon lawyer who first reported allegations of abuse to the Vatican in the 1980s, told the commission that the Catholic Church’s canon law had been used as an excuse in some instances by ecclesiastical authorities for not proceeding and taking action against reports of sexual abuse.
“The focus seems to have been consistently on the priest.
“Either getting [him] off the hook, taking care of him or punishing him in some way.”
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