UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter
NCR Staff | Jul. 6, 2015 NCR Today
30 years later
1962: Fr. Gerald Fitzgerald, founder of the Paraclete Center to aid troubled priests in Jimenez Springs, N.M., meets with Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani, head of the Holy Office in Rome, to warn him that there is no cure for pedophile priests.
1964: Fitzgerald meets with the new pope, Paul VI, to repeat his warnings.
1985: In May, Dominican Fr. Thomas Doyle, Fr. Michael Peterson and Ray Mouton present a 92-page document to a committee of the U.S. bishops’ conference, warning them to handle pending cases well, defend victims, and be honest with the public.
In June, NCR publishes its first exposé and editorial on sex abuse crisis. The story is based on Jason Berry’s reporting of the case of Fr. Gilbert Gauthe of Lafayette, La., who ultimately served 10 years of a 20-year sentence for molesting children.
1988: Barbara Blaine in Chicago starts the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP).
1992: U.S. bishops approve guidelines for handling sex abuse cases, but the guidelines are voluntary and not universally applied. They are later viewed as a failure.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.