BishopAccountability.org
	Abuses by Local Catholic Priests Boggle the Mind The Daily News April 18, 2010 http://www.memphisdailynews.com/editorial/Article.aspx?id=49372 Aweek and a half after the release of 10,000 pages of depositions and church documents about child sexual abuse and Memphis priests, it remains difficult to comprehend the magnitude of the crisis. There are actually two scandals – first, the sexual abuse of children and, second, the years-long cover-up of that abuse. A pastor had to tell the families of three children to keep their boys away from another priest in the parish because diocesan authorities failed to heed his complaints for years. It’s easy to say that was in the 1960s, when our society looked at this problem in a much different way. But sending priests away for counseling, which also conveniently gets them out of town, is the existing policy. So is restricting the contact a priest has with children and then largely relying on the priest to abide by the restriction. Until just five years ago the Catholic Diocese of Memphis didn’t report anything to anyone outside the church hierarchy. The diocese still disagrees that it is obligated by state law to report the sexual abuse of a child 13 or older. A Byzantine move within the Vatican in the past week demonstrates why this parsing is causing and prolonging real human suffering. It seems that since 2003 the Vatican department that sets the rules for handling such allegations – the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith – has required that all allegations of child sexual abuse by priests be reported to civil authorities. This past week, the guidelines were published for the first time in English. Juan Carlos Duran, a priest who wreaked havoc in Memphis, should have been reported to authorities the day in February 2000 a boy’s mother told church leaders what had happened to her son. The boy is referred to in court documents as John Doe. Since child sexual abuse complaints are confidential, there would have been no public police report. An investigation would have begun quietly. Since Duran confessed to diocesan officials, there would have been considerable publicity when Memphis police charged him. But the boy’s identity would have been protected. It is a process used everyday in our community by professionals at the Child Advocacy Center. There would be no mystery about Duran’s whereabouts. Church officials seem to believe he is in Bolivia, even though he was in trouble there too. They were adamant that Duran wasn’t a priest any longer, but for some reason didn’t know where he was. However, in 2003, they knew he had tested negative for the HIV virus. This and other cases – some more recent – became a bureaucratic shell game. Follow the paper trail of church leaders. One after another testified in depositions it wasn’t his job to check out Duran. It was always someone else’s job and they assumed someone else had done what they were supposed to do. Not surprisingly, no one did what they all were supposed to do – protect children from sexual predators. The failsafe for all of this office politics and hand wringing is to report such allegations immediately to the proper authorities – those not wearing collars.
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