The Vatican is currently facing criticism for rejecting an extradition request from Poland regarding the ex-papal nuncio to the Dominican Republic, Archbishop Jozef Wesolowski. Wesolowski, the highest-ranking Vatican official to be investigated for alleged sex abuse to date, is currently thought to be living in the Vatican.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/16/pope-francis-sexual-abuse_n_4612881.html
"The crimes and sins of sexual abuse of minors cannot be kept secret any longer. I commit myself to the zealous watchfulness of the church to protect minors, and I promise that all those responsible will be held accountable."
The maintenance of secrecy for these crimes is imposed by Article 25 of Pope John Paul II's motu proprio, Sacramentorum Sanctitatis Tutela of 2001 and by Article 30 of its revision by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010, which impose the pontifical secret on all allegations and proceedings relating to child sexual abuse by clerics. The footnotes to Article 25 and Article 30 apply Article 1(4) of Pope Paul VI's instruction, Secreta Continere, which defines the pontifical secret as the church's highest form of secrecy, and like the secret of the confessional, is a permanent silence. Since becoming pope two and a half years ago, Pope Francis has made no attempt to change this maintenance of secrecy, the very thing he condemned in Philadelphia.
Like Pope Benedict XVI in his 2010 pastoral letter to the people of Ireland, Pope Francis ignored the role of canon law in the cover up, and said, "I deeply regret that some bishops failed in their responsibility to protect children." There was not a word about the fact that in most cases such bishops were complying with the pontifical secret under canon law, and its requirement to try and cure the priest before any attempt was made to dismiss him.
A dispensation to allow reporting to the police where the civil law requires it was granted by the Holy See to the United States in 2002 and to the rest of the world in 2010, but where there are no such civil laws, the pontifical secret still applies. Very few countries have comprehensive reporting laws.
http://ncronline.org/news/accountab...ope-francis-words-and-actions-about-sex-abuse
Francis appears to have accepted the resignations of three American bishops who were in the midst of escalating scandals over their mishandling of abuse allegations: two bishops in Minnesota in June and one in April in Kansas City-St. Joseph in Missouri, where the bishop was the first to ever be criminally convicted of shielding a pedophile priest. But the bishops were allowed to leave office without the Vatican’s ever making clear why, and all three remain bishops.
The abuse scandal has hardly died down in the United States. On Tuesday, the day Francis arrived in the United States, a priest in Pennsylvania was convicted of abusing boys in an orphanage he supported for years in Honduras. The Archdiocese of Milwaukee just proposed a plan to settle claims with an estimated 570 victims in bankruptcy court.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/28/us/pope-francis-philadelphia-sexual-abuse.html?_r=0
The UN has accused the Vatican of "systematically" adopting policies allowing priests to sexually abuse thousands of children.
Pope Francis has said that dealing with abuse is vital for the Church's credibility, and that "sanctions" must be imposed against perpetrators.
But the Church has been accused of failing to address some allegations properly.
The UN's Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) said the Vatican should "immediately remove" all clergy who are known or suspected child abusers.
In a strongly worded report, it lambasted the Holy See's "practice of offenders' mobility", referring to the transfer of child abusers from parish to parish within countries, and sometimes abroad.
It complained that the Holy See had not acknowledged the extent of crimes committed and had not taken the measures necessary to address cases of child sexual abuse and to protect children.
Reacting to the UN report in February, Barbara Blaine, the president of Snap (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests), said it was clear that the Vatican had put the reputation of Church officials above protection of children.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-25757218
new Catholic bishops are still being taught they’re not obliged to report cases of child abuse by priests to the police.
The Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, which Francis set up with much fanfare in 2014, was supposed to issue guidelines for the Vatican on how to deal with child abuse. But the body was never consulted about the training for new bishops on exactly that topic.
These are just some of the signs that Francis’ reform efforts, and his pledge to clean up the Catholic Church’s most damaging crisis, seem to be unraveling before they’ve even really gotten started.
The problems come as Pope Francis pays a visit to Latin America, a region where, as GlobalPost has reported, the church is accused of reassigning and protecting many alleged predator priests. Among the latest scandals in the region, Chileans are outraged that the pope appointed a bishop accused of shielding the country's most despised pedophile priest from investigation.
http://www.pri.org/stories/2016-02-15/pope-francis-efforts-stop-church-child-abuse-are-falling-apart
One in 50 priests is a paedophile: Pope Francis says child abuse is 'leprosy' infecting the Catholic Church
Pope Francis quoted as saying figure included bishops and cardinals
He condemned child sex abuse as 'leprosy in the church', in interview
Vatican has said quotations 'didn't correspond to what pope actually said'
Damning reports by the UN this year have accused the Vatican of ‘systematically’ adopting policies that allowed priests to rape and molest thousands of children over decades, failing to report allegations to the authorities and transferring offenders to new dioceses where they could abuse again.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-paedophiles-interview-Italian-newspaper.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/16/pope-francis-sexual-abuse_n_4612881.html
"The crimes and sins of sexual abuse of minors cannot be kept secret any longer. I commit myself to the zealous watchfulness of the church to protect minors, and I promise that all those responsible will be held accountable."
The maintenance of secrecy for these crimes is imposed by Article 25 of Pope John Paul II's motu proprio, Sacramentorum Sanctitatis Tutela of 2001 and by Article 30 of its revision by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010, which impose the pontifical secret on all allegations and proceedings relating to child sexual abuse by clerics. The footnotes to Article 25 and Article 30 apply Article 1(4) of Pope Paul VI's instruction, Secreta Continere, which defines the pontifical secret as the church's highest form of secrecy, and like the secret of the confessional, is a permanent silence. Since becoming pope two and a half years ago, Pope Francis has made no attempt to change this maintenance of secrecy, the very thing he condemned in Philadelphia.
Like Pope Benedict XVI in his 2010 pastoral letter to the people of Ireland, Pope Francis ignored the role of canon law in the cover up, and said, "I deeply regret that some bishops failed in their responsibility to protect children." There was not a word about the fact that in most cases such bishops were complying with the pontifical secret under canon law, and its requirement to try and cure the priest before any attempt was made to dismiss him.
A dispensation to allow reporting to the police where the civil law requires it was granted by the Holy See to the United States in 2002 and to the rest of the world in 2010, but where there are no such civil laws, the pontifical secret still applies. Very few countries have comprehensive reporting laws.
http://ncronline.org/news/accountab...ope-francis-words-and-actions-about-sex-abuse
Francis appears to have accepted the resignations of three American bishops who were in the midst of escalating scandals over their mishandling of abuse allegations: two bishops in Minnesota in June and one in April in Kansas City-St. Joseph in Missouri, where the bishop was the first to ever be criminally convicted of shielding a pedophile priest. But the bishops were allowed to leave office without the Vatican’s ever making clear why, and all three remain bishops.
The abuse scandal has hardly died down in the United States. On Tuesday, the day Francis arrived in the United States, a priest in Pennsylvania was convicted of abusing boys in an orphanage he supported for years in Honduras. The Archdiocese of Milwaukee just proposed a plan to settle claims with an estimated 570 victims in bankruptcy court.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/28/us/pope-francis-philadelphia-sexual-abuse.html?_r=0
The UN has accused the Vatican of "systematically" adopting policies allowing priests to sexually abuse thousands of children.
Pope Francis has said that dealing with abuse is vital for the Church's credibility, and that "sanctions" must be imposed against perpetrators.
But the Church has been accused of failing to address some allegations properly.
The UN's Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) said the Vatican should "immediately remove" all clergy who are known or suspected child abusers.
In a strongly worded report, it lambasted the Holy See's "practice of offenders' mobility", referring to the transfer of child abusers from parish to parish within countries, and sometimes abroad.
It complained that the Holy See had not acknowledged the extent of crimes committed and had not taken the measures necessary to address cases of child sexual abuse and to protect children.
Reacting to the UN report in February, Barbara Blaine, the president of Snap (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests), said it was clear that the Vatican had put the reputation of Church officials above protection of children.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-25757218
new Catholic bishops are still being taught they’re not obliged to report cases of child abuse by priests to the police.
The Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, which Francis set up with much fanfare in 2014, was supposed to issue guidelines for the Vatican on how to deal with child abuse. But the body was never consulted about the training for new bishops on exactly that topic.
These are just some of the signs that Francis’ reform efforts, and his pledge to clean up the Catholic Church’s most damaging crisis, seem to be unraveling before they’ve even really gotten started.
The problems come as Pope Francis pays a visit to Latin America, a region where, as GlobalPost has reported, the church is accused of reassigning and protecting many alleged predator priests. Among the latest scandals in the region, Chileans are outraged that the pope appointed a bishop accused of shielding the country's most despised pedophile priest from investigation.
http://www.pri.org/stories/2016-02-15/pope-francis-efforts-stop-church-child-abuse-are-falling-apart
One in 50 priests is a paedophile: Pope Francis says child abuse is 'leprosy' infecting the Catholic Church
Pope Francis quoted as saying figure included bishops and cardinals
He condemned child sex abuse as 'leprosy in the church', in interview
Vatican has said quotations 'didn't correspond to what pope actually said'
Damning reports by the UN this year have accused the Vatican of ‘systematically’ adopting policies that allowed priests to rape and molest thousands of children over decades, failing to report allegations to the authorities and transferring offenders to new dioceses where they could abuse again.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-paedophiles-interview-Italian-newspaper.html
