Prelate criticizes USA Today for saying bishops backsliding on abuse

Published: 2005-02-23

ST. PAUL, Minn. (CNS) -- The head of the U.S. bishops' Ad Hoc Committee on Sexual Abuse has criticized a USA Today editorial saying that the bishops are backsliding on their child sex abuse prevention programs. Catholics "should be aware and reassured that your bishops are not retreating from the charter adopted in Dallas 30 months ago," said Archbishop Harry J. Flynn of St. Paul-Minneapolis, ad hoc committee chairman. He was referring to the 2002 "Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People," adopted by the bishops in Dallas, which contains the U.S. church's sex abuse prevention policies. "A lasting effect of the clergy sex abuse scandal seems to be that fairness and recognition of the progress the American church has made in ending this tragedy, particularly over the past three years, are being dismissed by some of the mass media," he said in a column appearing in the Feb. 24 issue of his archdiocesan newspaper, The Catholic Spirit.

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