GUAM
Radio New Zealand
The Catholic Church in Guam is being accused of rewarding a priest who shielded its Archbishop from abuse allegations.
The Concerned Catholics of Guam has written a letter to the church questioning the decision to send Father Adrian Cristobal to study in Canada.
Its President David Sablan told Jo O’Brien Father Cristobal is also a member of an alternative movement within the Church that has caused division and abused its resources.
TRANSCRIPT
DAVID SABLAN: Father Adrian Cristobal was the chancellor during the reign of Archbishop Anthony Apuron who was allegedly accused of numerous sexual abuse of young altar boys when he was the pastor prior to being elevated to bishop. I would believe that Father Cristobal knew about some of these allegations but basically did not say much about it and again that’s just my opinion knowing how he interacted with the Archbishop. But our concern primarily is that he has basically lied about numerous issues and now we find that this new Archbishop, Archbishop Byrnes has basically decided to send him off to study Canon Law in Canada, which in the opinion of many in Concerned Catholics it’s basically a reward for his misdeeds, that’s the only way we can look at it.
JO O’BRIEN: When you say a reward for his misdeeds, do you mean that he has effectively been rewarded for protecting Archbishop Apuron?
DAVID SABLAN That’s kind of how we view it because of the fact that he has really been one of the individuals that has caused this division within our church here because he is a member of this Neocatechumenal Way, and he has been giving them many favours and, you know, he was also very instrumental in providing them resources from our Archdiocese to continue their religious practices here on the island and of course there’s a seminary that was taken over by the Neocatechumenal Way and that has been funded by the Archdiocese and in the end we felt that he should be disciplined rather than being sent off to go study Canon Law.
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