Pope Shows Means Business on Fighting Child Abuse
Gazzetta del Sud
Vatican City, September 24 - Pope Francis said he wanted the Catholic Church to have "zero tolerance" with cases of child abuse after being elected to its helm last year. The arrest in the Vatican Tuesday of a former archbishop, Pole Jozef Wesolowski, on charges of allegedly abusing children while he was a papal ambassador in the Dominican Republic has been interpreted as a sign that actions are backing up the pontiff's words. Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said the arrest was conducted "in accordance with the Pope's express will that such a grave and delicate case be addressed without delay, with the just and necessary rigor". The arrest was the first inside the Vatican for alleged paedophilia. Wesolowski, who was recalled to Rome last year, was defrocked by a Vatican canon law tribunal in June after being found guilty of child abuse. This followed an investigation by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the former Holy Inquisition, which handles sex-abuse cases. The 66-year-old was put under house arrest on Tuesday at a facility inside the Vatican, rather than taken to a cell, due to ill health, pending a criminal trial. He could face six or seven years in prison, Lombardi said Wednesday, adding that the former archbishop was also charged with possessing child pornography and that his trial will start late this year or early in 2015. The possible sentence would have been much longer, but Lombardi said that new stiffer Vatican laws on paedophilia that came into force in September 2013 could not be applied as the alleged crimes took place before. Lombardi explained that Wesolowski's arrest was aimed at "preventing the possibility that the accused would flee and possible evidence tampering". The Church's image has been tarnished by a long series of clergy paedophilia scandals in several parts of the world, many of which emerged during the papacy of Francis's predecessor, Benedict XVI. Sex-abuse cases have cost Catholic dioceses and religious orders around the world billions of dollars in legal fees and settlements. In February the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child said in a report that the Holy See had "adopted policies and practices which have led to the continuation of the abuse by, and the impunity of, the perpetrators". Francis has made repairing the damage by the scandals one of his priorities. He has apologised for the abuse several times. He also stiffened the punishments in the Holy See's law on paedophilia and set up a special commission to advise him on how the Catholic Church should protect children and help victims of sexual abuse by the clergy The pope appointed three clergy and five lay people from eight countries, with seven from Europe or the United States, including four women. At a Mass for victims in July, Francis made an anguished plea for forgiveness over child-abuse scandals, begging that the Catholic Church be absolved for sex crimes. "I ask forgiveness before God and His people," the pope said about a phenomenon that brings 600 cases worldwide to the Vatican's door each year. "I also beg forgiveness for the sins of omission by Church leaders", he added, referring to well-publicised cover-ups around the Catholic world. Priests' sexual violence against children is "execrable" and "left scars lasting a lifetime". On Wednesday David Clohessy, the Director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), welcomed Wesolowski's arrest but said the Church was not going far enough. He alleged that Vatican was still protecting Wesolowski, who is under investigation in the Dominican Republic, from secular prosecution. "While we are glad Wesolowski has allegedly been restricted, we are concerned it took so long for this to happen and doubt strongly that Catholic officials will enforce this move," added Clohessy
|
.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.