Print Issue: October 24, 2002

Revised Archdiocesan Policy On Hold - Vatican Asks For Joint Commission To Revise Sex Abuse Norms

Bishop Wilton D. Gregory, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, smiles during a press conference at the North American College in Rome Oct. 18. Bishop Gregory said a joint commission of the U.S. bishops and Vatican officials will work to study and revise key elements of the U.S. bishops' clergy sex abuse norms. (CNS photo by Alessia Giuliani, Catholic Press Photo)

By John Thavis, CNS

ROME (CNS) - In its long-awaited response to the U.S. bishops' sex abuse norms, the Vatican has called for a joint commission to study and revise some of the key elements of the bishops' plan before formal Vatican approval is granted.

The announcement Oct. 18 led the Archdiocese of Atlanta to hold up release of its own revised sexual abuse policy pending the outcome of the joint commission's work.

That work is expected to be complete by mid-November when the U.S. bishops hold their annual meeting in Washington, D.C.

The Vatican said it was concerned that "ambiguity and confusion" could arise when the norms are applied, because some provisions are "difficult to reconcile with the universal law of the church."

Problematic areas include:

• the definition of sexual abuse;
   
• the role of diocesan review boards; and canonical procedures for dealing with priests who have abused minors.

Bishop Wilton D. Gregory, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said a commission made up of four U.S. bishops and four Vatican officials would meet soon and hoped to finish its work in time for the November meeting of U.S. bishops.

"We're dealing with a basically sound document that needs modification rather than recasting," Bishop Gregory told reporters at a Rome press conference. He said the commission would be "fine-tuning" the norms, and that the Vatican had not categorically rejected any element of the bishops' sex abuse plan.

"Nothing (in the charter and norms) has been taken off the table," he said. "Nothing has been ruled out."

He said the commission's review did not mean that implementation of the sex abuse charter was now "frozen" in U.S. dioceses.

"The mixed commission has not asked the bishops to stop pursuing the charter. It simply says let us sit down and talk together about issues that need to be clarified or modified so that 'recognitio' can be granted to the norms," he said.

Bishop Gregory said the joint review did not imply a softening of the bishops' policies.

"We have not stepped back from our compassion for those who have been harmed, nor from our determination to put into place policies that will protect children," he said.

Bishop Gregory made public a two-page letter from Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, head of the Vatican's Congregation for Bishops. The letter voiced strong support for the bishops' efforts to respond to the sex abuse crisis, but said the Vatican saw possible areas of confusion and questions of interpretation in the norms.

At a meeting in Dallas last June, the bishops overwhelmingly approved the "essential norms" that outlined strict penalties against priests who sexually abuse minors, along with a "Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People." Vatican approval, or "recognitio," would make the norms binding in all U.S. dioceses.

Cardinal Re's carefully worded letter was the result of weeks of internal discussion among five Vatican departments. It reflected the unease voiced privately by some officials that certain provisions of the norms may violate the due-process rights of accused priests.

But rather than simply reject the norms, the Vatican asked the bishops to work with them to resolve the remaining difficulties.

"It has been judged appropriate that before the 'recognitio' can be granted, a further reflection on and revision of the norms and the charter are necessary," Cardinal Re wrote.

Cardinal Re described three problem areas in general terms; Bishop Gregory gave more specific examples in his statement:

- Cardinal Re said the norms and the charter contain provisions that "in some aspects are difficult to reconcile with the universal law of the church."

Bishop Gregory said an example was the proper role of review boards, which are to be established in every diocese. Although these were envisioned as consultative bodies, Vatican officials are concerned that bishops might be held accountable to these boards; they say that would be an unacceptable infringement on the bishop's authority.

- Cardinal Re said the terminology of the norms and the charter was "at times vague or imprecise and therefore difficult to interpret."

Bishop Gregory said an example was the term "sexual abuse." The U.S. bishops' charter said sex abuse "need not be a complete act of intercourse" and cited a definition that said sexual abuse of children need not involve physical or genital contact. Vatican officials fear that this is too ambiguous and relies too much on subjective feelings of a victim to define the crime.

- Cardinal Re said that "questions also remain concerning the concrete manner in which the procedures outlined in the norms and charter are to be applied in conjunction with the requirements of the Code of Canon Law" and with Pope John Paul II's 2001 apostolic letter, "Sacramentorum sanctitatis tutela," which gave to the Vatican's doctrinal congregation oversight on cases of clerical sex abuse against minors.

Bishop Gregory said an example of the Vatican's concern in this area would be the procedures for dealing with a priest who is known to have abused a minor. The U.S. bishops' plan says that a priest who has committed any act of sexual abuse against a minor - past, present or future - is to be permanently removed from the active ministry. It also sets dismissal from the priesthood as a standard penalty, even against a priest's will, but allows for some exceptions.

Those provisions are more strict and less flexible than those of canon law or the pope's 2001 letter. However, the U.S. bishops' plan said explicitly that church law procedures would be respected. Now, Bishop Gregory said, the Vatican wants "further specification" on how that will be done.

Bishop Gregory spent a week in October meeting with Vatican officials and said he came away convinced that the Vatican wants to work out remaining problems in a spirit of cooperation.

He said Vatican officials "have shown great pastoral care in their sensitivity to the pain caused to victims, their commitment to the need to protect society from perpetrators of abuse, their regard for the respect that needs to be shown the rights of the accused, and their pain at the anguish caused to faithful Catholics by this sinful and criminal conduct."

Bishop Gregory said that when he and other conference officials met with the pope Oct. 17 they did not discuss in detail the sex abuse policy.

Bishop Gregory said he was in the process of appointing the four U.S. bishops to the mixed commission. The Vatican members will come from the congregations for the Doctrine of the Faith, for Bishops and for Clergy and the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts.

At a separate press conference Oct. 18, Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos, head of the clergy congregation, said he was concerned that the U.S. approach to clerical sex abuse did not do enough to protect the rights of accused priests. The church defends the human rights of everyone and "does not privilege the ecclesiastical delinquent when it defends his rights," he said.

He said church policies must reflect the right of accused priests to their good name, especially because of the risk of false accusations.

Cardinal Castrillon said the commission must come up with a formula that provides for a "strong and clear response" to clerical sex abuse without at the same time "going against the fundamental principles of the church."

Archbishop John F. Donoghue said the revised sexual abuse policy of the Archdiocese of Atlanta, which a committee has been working on since the charter was adopted in June, anticipated some of the Vatican's concerns.

"I don't think (the Vatican response) is going to have a major impact (on the Atlanta policy) because we prepared ours with those concerns in mind," the archbishop said.

He said the Atlanta policy will be held up in deference to the outcome of the joint commission's work. The archdiocese already had a sexual abuse policy in place, revised most recently in 1994. However, following the adoption of the charter in Dallas, "we worked it all over again," Archbishop Donoghue said.

Based on his training in canon law, the archbishop said he expected some problem areas for the Vatican to be due process for accused priests and clarity that the role of the predominantly lay advisory board is purely advisory and doesn't impinge on a bishop's authority.

The documents adopted in Dallas "did not give a lot of due process (for accused priests)," he said, "certainly not what American jurisprudence would allow."

"You have to define what you mean by (a) credible (accusation) . . . It's one thing to accuse. It's another to prove."

While he supports the charter, he said, "I think the document can be better . . . Hopefully (the joint commission review) will make it more workable."

Archbishop Donoghue said he hopes the November bishops' meeting will lead to a final resolution so a clear, consistent policy can be put in place across the country.

"The pope has said, and the bishops have said, our primary consideration has to be the protection of children."

Contributing to this story was John Norton at the Vatican and Gretchen Keiser in Atlanta.