VATICAN CITY
Catholic News Service
By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Bishops of dioceses around the world have an obligation to work to prevent clerical sexual abuse and to ensure that priests in their dioceses do not commit acts of abuse, said Cardinal Gerhard Muller, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
“If, unfortunately, these crimes are verified, they fall under the exclusive competence of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which, however, always needs the assistance and collaboration of ordinaries and well-prepared canonists to act effectively and prudently,” he said in a speech at Rome’s Pontifical Urbanian University.
The Vatican newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, printed what it described as “ample excerpts” from the speech March 12.
The cardinal spoke during a March 9-10 special course at the university looking specifically at “crimes against the sacrament of penance.” However, he spoke in general about the crimes the church defines as “more grave delicts,” which includes the sexual abuse of minors.
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