BishopAccountability.org
	Church’s Response to Sex Abuse Began Long Before Crisis of 2002 By C.T. Maier and Robert P. Lockwood Pittsburgh Catholic [United States] June 8, 2007 http://www.pittsburghcatholic.org/newsarticles_more.phtml?id=1953 First of a two-part series. This month, five years have passed since the U.S. Catholic bishops responded to the clergy sexual abuse crisis by approving the “Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People.” During that time, the Catholic Church in the United States has done more than perhaps any other institution in the world to confront the problem of child sexual abuse. Yet, many Catholics are unaware of what the church has been doing on the issue. In fact, a recent survey by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University found that as many as 80 percent of American Catholics didn’t know that the church had done anything at all. Even a casual look at the church’s response, though, reveals a dedicated and long-standing effort to protect children and youth. Behind the charter One rarely discussed fact in the media coverage of clergy sexual abuse is that long before the scandal broke, many Catholic dioceses already had written, enforced policies in place before much of the country paid attention at all to the issue of the sexual abuse of children. In fact, because of actions taken by church leadership, reports of clergy abuse of minors had virtually disappeared since the early 1990s. Nationwide, there have been only a handful of accusations of abuse after 1993. Even when the Archdiocese of Boston was aggressively pursued by both the Massachusetts attorney general and local media in 2002, not one case of abuse could be found after 1993. And so while media coverage of the clergy abuse scandal often made it seem as if the charter appeared out of thin air, the changes that it brought to the church actually began long before 2002. The fact that so many of the abuse cases that emerged during the scandal were old ones testifies to the effectiveness of the church’s efforts. The Diocese of Pittsburgh was no exception. Since 1985, it has had written policies for dealing with clergy sexual abuse of minors. At the very beginning of his administration in 1988, then-Bishop Donald Wuerl strengthened those policies, and the diocese, like others nationwide, has regularly and rigorously refined, updated and expanded its policies to ensure, in the words of Pope John Paul II, that “there is no place in the priesthood for those who would harm the young.” In 1992, the bishops approved five foundational principles for addressing the issue of sexual abuse: responding promptly to all allegations of abuse, quickly removing alleged offenders when allegations are supported, complying with civil law, reaching out to victims and families, and dealing as openly as possible with allegations while maintaining confidentiality. By 1994, when the bishops approved a set of national guidelines called “Restoring Trust,” the principles were already part of the “best practices” of many dioceses. Less than a decade later, the “Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People” drew on those principles to create one of the farthest reaching set of guidelines combatting child abuse in history. The charter’s provisions on promoting healing and effective response to abuse were particularly important and far-reaching. Promoting healing To promote healing, the charter called for outreach to all victims and a prompt response to any allegations where there is reason to believe that sexual abuse of a minor has occurred. Well before the charter, though, the diocese emphasized sensitivity in its outreach to victims. Under the direction of a lay victim assistance coordinator hired under Bishop Wuerl in 1993, the diocese has offered outside counseling services and recommended support groups and social service assistance to victims and their families. Since the clergy sexual abuse crisis emerged in 2002, the diocese provided and advertised a toll-free line for abuse victims (1-888-808-1235). Last year, with the help of a victim, the diocese began a new outreach effort with new materials, which were titled “To Renew What is Broken,” which were sent to each parish and posted on the diocesan Web site at www.diopitt.org/abuse_outreach.php. The material written by the victim is particularly powerful. “When a trusted member of the church has hurt you or a loved one, it can shake the foundation of your whole belief system,” the victim wrote. “An important part of healing was discovering that my spiritual being was also injured and needed care.” The victim who initiated the effort and helped create the materials lives in the diocese and is an active parishioner. Though the victim was not originally from the diocese and the abuse occurred elsewhere, the victim approached the diocese because of Bishop Wuerl’s national reputation on the issue. Guaranteeing effective response To guarantee an effective response to allegations of sexual abuse of minors, the charter emphasized the swift and decisive handling of abuse cases. In the diocese, this has meant a zero-tolerance policy, in which just one offense means permanent removal from ministry, even without civil authorities determining if the offense can be prosecutable. Removal from ministry means that the priest is no longer able to celebrate Mass publicly, hear confessions, wear clerical garb or present himself as a member of the clergy. At the same time, no priest or deacon who abused a minor had been knowingly transferred to another parochial assignment in the diocese, and it has been the clear, known and published policy of the diocese well before the charter that such clergy would be removed from parochial ministry. The diocese requires documents that attest that any priest or deacon coming from another diocese has never been involved in sexual misconduct with a minor. An important part of the process is the diocesan review board, which has been in place in the diocese since 1989. With a membership ranging from lawyers and psychologists to even parents of victims, the review board advises the bishop on all allegations of sexual misconduct and suitability for ministry. In keeping with national guidelines, the majority of the board’s members are not diocesan employees. The charter also made it clear that effective response means a commitment to transparency and openness. Procedures for filing complaints of sexual abuse must be readily available and their availability publicly announced, as are clear and well-publicized standards of ministerial behavior. The diocese’s Code of Pastoral Conduct outlines standards expected of all who act in the name of the church. The code outlines behavioral standards not only for priests, deacons and seminarians and lay people and members of consecrated life employed by the diocese or any of its parishes, but also for anyone who volunteers, from parish social ministers and extraordinary ministers of holy Communion to choir members and greeters. The diocese’s commitment to transparency also means working closely with civil authorities. During the abuse scandal, many in the media raised questions about the church’s pastoral practice of maintaining the confidentiality of abuse cases. To address this concern, the charter asked that no confidentiality agreements be entered into in dealing with accusations of sexual abuse of minors, except for grave reasons raised by the victim. As a mandated reporter of child abuse, the diocese reports all allegations of victims directly to civil authorities. This year, changes to Pennsylvania’s Child Protective Services Law have increased the burdens on those who work with young people by making failure to report child abuse a crime. The diocese has provided materials on the changes to parishes and schools, and will be providing training on the changes this fall. Continuing to reach out Bishop Paul Bradley, diocesan administrator since Archbishop Wuerl’s appointment to Washington, D.C., has reaffirmed the diocese’s commitment to victims of abuse. “The sexual abuse of minors, wherever it occurs, is a tragedy in our society,” Bishop Bradley said. “The sexual abuse scandal taught us — as a church and a society — that we all need to do a better job to reach out to those who have been hurt by sexual abuse. The Diocese of Pittsburgh will continue to do so.”
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.