Nov 3, 2002 4 min read

BOSTON (AP) – Molestation victims said Saturday that children will be more vulnerable under a revised sex abuse policy for U.S. Roman Catholic clergy that sets up tribunals to hear cases against priests and outlines how bishops should work with the church’s statute of limitations. Some Catholic observers and priests, however, said the new plan provides vital protections for wrongfully accused clergy. And a key bishop rejected the idea that the tribunals will be give laity no voice.

The updated policy, negotiated by four American prelates and four Vatican officials earlier this week, calls for tribunals to try the cases of accused priests and mandates that guilty clerics be removed from church work, and – in some cases – the priesthood itself.

The revisions would become binding church law if approved by the U.S. bishops at a meeting Nov. 11-14 and by the Vatican in a final review.

The Vatican withheld approval of the first version of the plan, which the bishops overwhelmingly passed last June.

While the new policy has not been publicly released, church leaders involved in the negotiations have given some media briefings.

David Clohessy, director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, called it a “radical departure” from the earlier policy.

“They had promised more involvement of lay people, and now the tribunal process guarantees less involvement of lay people,” Clohessy said. “They are creating an entire new bureaucratic layer of priests, who will judge their brother priests.”

But at a news conference Saturday, Bishop William Lori of Bridgeport, Conn., rejected the idea that tribunals would be controlled by the church.

Lori, who helped negotiate the revised plan, said that while priests will act as judges on the panels, other people – including lawyers – involved in the cases could be lay people.

“The big thing to know about these tribunals is that they are part of a very well thought-out process designed to protect human rights,” Lori said.

The clerical sex abuse crisis erupted in the Boston Archdiocese early this year with revelations that an accused molester was shuttled between parishes even after molestation claims had surfaced. At least 300 of the 46,000 priests in the United States have either resigned or been suspended this year because of abuse accusations.

Ray Flynn, former Boston mayor and U.S. ambassador to the Vatican, said the revised policy addresses key concerns about priests’ rights.

“The first gave protection to victims,” he said, “but didn’t give protection to accused priests.”

Thomas O’Connor, a Boston College church historian and author, said due process for priests had been a “sticking point” that needed to be addressed.

He cited the example of Monsignor Michael Smith Foster, who was reinstated Wednesday to judicial vicar of the Archdiocese of Boston after being suspended twice over sexual abuse allegations. The archdiocese later said the allegations were “unsubstantiated.”

“Out of the blue, there were allegations and he was called in to be dismissed,” O’Connor said. “The assumption here is immediately that the priest is guilty.”

Rev. Robert Bullock, head of Boston Priests Forum, an association of more than 100 priests, said he was optimistic that the revised policy would be fair to both victims and priests.

“We’ve been talking about accountability for a while, and I think there should be some kind of caution here to ensure due process,” he said.

In one change from the Dallas policy, the statute of limitations under church law – abuse cases must be filed before victims reaches age 28 – would now apply. However, each bishop is directed to ask the Holy See for an exception to the age limit if he thinks the situation requires it.

Clohessy said this would be unfair to victims because most cases would be excluded by the statute.

“An overwhelming number of people come forth with allegations in their 30s, 40s and 50s,” he said. “This leads both survivors, their families and the Catholic parents feeling more discouraged and more disillusioned than before.”