PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Wheeling-CharlestonTruth.org
For immediate release: Wednesday, May 2
Statement by Barbara Dorris, SNAP Outreach Director (314.862.7688, SNAPdorris@gmail.com)
Soon Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput will disclose the status of perhaps dozens of accused child molesting clerics. No matter what he specifically announces, we remain highly skeptical of church abuse processes.
We also believe that Chaput has recklessly kept kids in harm’s way by sitting on most of these decisions for months. At the outset, we said that citizens and Catholics need and deserve to know as soon as possible whether church officials consider each allegation credible. And we predicted that for public relations reasons, Chaput would wait and announce all the decision at once. How will he and his lawyers and staff feel if it turns out that a child was sexually assaulted by one of these clerics while Chaput delayed announcing that he was credibly accused’
(Chaput’s claim that to announce his decision about these priests might violate a court gag order is spurious.)
We’re skeptical because the so-called “reforms” made in Philly in recent months are virtually identical to the so-called reforms made by bishops across the US in 2002. Given the church hierarchy’s continuing horrific track record on abuse, we just can’t be reassured by or give real credence to the workings or findings of internal church abuse proceedings.
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