VATICAN CITY
Reuters
May 23, 2019
By Philip Pullella
Italy’s Roman Catholic bishops on Thursday enacted a new policy on reporting suspected cases of sexual abuse by priests, but they stopped short of making it mandatory to inform police at first instance.
Under the policy, church authorities would carry out a preliminary investigation then decide whether to refer it to police.
The measure drew a skeptical response from victims’ groups mindful of past Church cover-ups of abuses by clergymen.
The policy does however go further than that laid out by Pope Francis earlier this month which mandated the world’s one million priests and nuns to report all suspicion of sexual abuse by clerics of any level to their superiors.
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