Polish bishop resigns over sex abuse cover-up charges

WARSAW (POLAND)
La Croix International [France]

May 13, 2021

Seventy-two-year-old Bishop Jan Tyrawa is found guilty of negligence and cover-up.

Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Polish Bishop Jan Tyrawa of Bydgoszcz, at the end of a Vatican investigation into allegations that he covered up clerical sexual abuse.

A Vatican-led probe concluded that the 72-year-old bishop failed to properly handle clerical abuse against minors, said a May 12 statement from the apostolic nunciature in Poland.

“Following formal reports, the Holy See — acting in accordance with the “motu proprio” Vos estis lux mundi — conducted proceedings concerning the reported negligence of the bishop,” the statement said.

The “motu proprio”, which the pope issued in 2019, established new procedures and norms to hold bishops and religious superiors accountable for abusive clergy continuing in pastoral ministry.

“After completing this procedure, taking into account also other difficulties in managing the diocese” the bishop resigned, said the statement of the nunciature.

Bishop Tyrawa’s lawyer, Edmund Dobecki, told the Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza on May 12 that the bishop was planning to quit for some time, after calls from Polish legislators and protesters.

Protesters demonstrated outside the bishop’s residence several times, most recently on April 8, the paper said.

Bishop Tyrawa, who has headed the Bydgoszcz diocese in northern Poland since 2004, was accused of supporting abusive tendencies of one of his priests in February 2020.

The bishop is accused of protecting a priest even after he had been detained by police and suspended from another diocese for propositioning boys and storing child pornography on his computer.

The bishop continued transferring the priest from one parish to another, rather than removing him from pastoral duties.

The accused priest, Pawel Kania, was jailed in 2015 for seven years.

The complaint by a former altar boy in the diocese saw Bishop Tyrawa testifying in a court during a settlement hearing.

The victim was awarded $80,000 compensation, to be paid by the diocese and the archdiocese of Wrocław.

Bishop Tyrawa was ordained a priest for the Archdiocese of Wrocław in 1973.

He was named an auxiliary bishop of the archdiocese in 1988.Tyrawa is the latest Polish bishop to face the probe under Vos estis.

he Vatican reproved two retired bishops last March after they were found negligent in handling clergy accused of sexually abusing minors.

Pope Francis instructed two retired bishops — Sławoj Leszek Głódź of Gdańsk and Edward Janiak of Kalisz — to live outside their former dioceses.

They have also been barred from participating in public liturgies within the territories of the dioceses.

Eighty-two-year-old Bishop Tadeusz Rakoczy of Bielsko–Żywiec, who retired in 2013, also faced a probe under the new procedure meant to deal with alleged cover-ups.

Polish bishops published a report in 2019 that revealed 382 cases between 1990-2018, which involved 624 victims.

https://international.la-croix.com/news/religion/polish-bishop-resigns-over-sex-abuse-cover-up-charges/14303