German Bishops Halt Abuse Inquiry

Irish Times
January 9, 2013

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2013/0109/breaking42.html

In Germany, some 180,000 Catholics left the church in protest in 2010, a 40 per cent jump over the previous year, after a wave of abuse revelations. Photograph: Reuters

Germany's Roman Catholic bishops cancelled a study into sex abuse scandals within their church today, prompting the lead researcher to accuse them of trying to censor his findings.

Bishop Stephan Ackermann, spokesman on abuse issues for the German Bishops Conference, said the bishops had lost confidence in researcher Christian Pfeiffer and would look for another specialist to continue the study.

Mr Pfeiffer told German Radio the bishops, who had agreed with him in 2011 to open staff files for nine diocese dating back to 1945, had begun demanding changes in the project guidelines including a final veto over publishing its results.

"We regret that this project ... cannot be continued and we will have to find a new partner," Bishop Ackermann said in a statement.

He said they could no longer work with Mr Pfeiffer because of the way he dealt with the church hierarchy, but did not elaborate.

Catholic bishops in Ireland, United States, Belgium and the Netherlands have agreed to similar investigations into the files on priests accused of molesting children, sometimes with devastating results for the reputation of their church.

Irish clerical sex abuse inquiries have revealed widespread abuse and a pattern of secrecy to cover them up, which has resulted in three bishops being forced to resign as a result.

In Germany, some 180,000 Catholics left the church in protest in 2010, a 40 per cent jump over the previous year, after a wave of revelations about priests abusing young boys in boarding schools and other church institutions.