May 12, 2005

Bishops to revise clergy sex abuse charter, norms

WASHINGTON (DC)
Catholic News Service

By Jerry Filteau
Catholic News Service

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- When the U.S. bishops meet in June, they will work to revise their "Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People" and the "Essential Norms" implementing the charter legislatively.

They will also be asked to approve spending up to $1 million from their reserve funds to fund a major study into the causes and context behind the decades of clergy sexual abuse of minors that exploded into a major church crisis in 2002.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops meets June 16-18 in Chicago.

The documents the bishops will be asked to revise and renew were originally adopted in 2002 with a projected two-year life span before review. That life span was extended when the bishops were not able to conduct the revisions at their November 2004 meeting.

Proposed revisions in the "Essential Norms" are few and limited in scope.

Posted by kshaw at May 12, 2005 04:17 PM