German sex abuse scandal reaches Pope

[Cees Binkhorst]

REPLY TO: D66 at nic.surfnet.nl

Na het kleine tikje op Bush's hand heb ik dit wel verwacht ;)

Groet / Cees

Originally published 09:26 p.m., March 12, 2010, updated 12:21 a.m.,
March 13, 2010
German sex abuse scandal reaches Pope
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/12/german-sex-abuse-scandal-reaches-pope/
Nicole Winfield ASSOCIATED PRESS

VATICAN CITY (AP) -- Germany's sex abuse scandal has now reached Pope
Benedict XVI: His former archdiocese disclosed that while he was
archbishop a suspected pedophile priest was transferred to a job where
he later abused children.

The pontiff is also under increasing fire for a 2001 Vatican document he
later penned instructing bishops to keep such cases secret.

The revelations have put the spotlight on Benedict's handling of abuse
claims both when he was archbishop of Munich from 1977-1982 and then the
prefect of the Vatican office that deals with such crimes -- a position
he held until his 2005 election as pope.

And they may lead to further questions about what the pontiff knew about
the scope of abuse in his native Germany, when he knew it and what he
did about it during his tenure in Munich and quarter-century term at the
Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Benedict got a firsthand readout of the scandal Friday from the head of
the German Bishop's Conference, Archbishop Robert Zollitsch, who
reported that the pontiff had expressed "great dismay and deep shock"
over the scandal, but encouraged bishops to continue searching for the
truth.

Hours later, the Munich archdiocese admitted that it had allowed a
priest suspected of having abused a child to return to pastoral work in
the 1980s, while Benedict was archbishop. It stressed that the former
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger didn't know about the transfer and that it had
been decided by a lower-ranking official.

The archdiocese said there were no accusations against the chaplain,
identified only as H., during his 1980-1982 spell in Munich, where he
underwent therapy for suspected "sexual relations with boys." But he
then moved to nearby Grafing, where he was suspended in early 1985
following new accusations of sexual abuse. The following year, he was
convicted of sexually abusing minors.

The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, issued a statement
late Friday noting that the Munich vicar-general who approved the
priest's transfer had taken "full responsibility" for the decision,
seeking to remove any question about the pontiff's potential
responsibility as archbishop at the time.

Victims' advocates weren't persuaded.

"We find it extraordinarily hard to believe that Ratzinger didn't
reassign the predator, or know about the reassignment," said Barbara
Blaine, president and founder of SNAP, Survivors Network of those Abused
by Priests.

Already, the scandal was inching closer to Benedict after allegations of
abuse surfaced at the prestigious choir that was led by his brother,
Georg Ratzinger, from 1964 until 1994. Ratzinger has repeatedly said the
sexual abuse allegations date from before his tenure as choir director
and that he never heard of them, although he acknowledged slapping
pupils as punishment.

The pope, meanwhile, continues to be under fire for a 2001 Vatican
letter he sent to all bishops advising them that all cases of sexual
abuse of minors must be forwarded to his then-office, the Congregation
for the Doctrine of the Faith, and that the cases were to be subject to
pontifical secret.

Germany's justice minister, Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, has
cited the document as evidence that the Vatican created a "wall of
silence" around abuse cases that prevented prosecution. Irish bishops
have said the document had been "widely misunderstood" by the bishops
themselves to mean they shouldn't go to police. And lawyers for abuse
victims in the United States have cited the document in arguing that the
Catholic Church tried to obstruct justice.

But canon lawyers insisted Friday that there was nothing in the document
that would preclude bishops from fulfilling their moral and civic duties
of going to police when confronted with a case of child abuse.

They stressed that the document merely concerned procedures for handling
the church trial of an accused priest, and that the secrecy required by
Rome for that hearing by no means extended to a ban on reporting such
crimes to civil authorities.

"Canon law concerning grave crimes ... doesn't in any way interfere with
or diminish the obligations of the faithful to civil laws," said
Monsignor Davide Cito, a professor of canon law at Rome's Santa Croce
University.

The letter doesn't tell bishops to also report the crimes to police.

But the Rev. John Coughlin, a law professor at the University of Notre
Dame Law School, said it didn't need to. A general principle of moral
theology to which every bishop should adhere is that church officials
are obliged to follow civil laws where they live, he said.

Yet Bishop John McAreavey of Dromore in Northern Ireland, told a news
conference this week that Irish bishops "widely misinterpreted" the
directive and couldn't get a clear reading from Rome on how to proceed.

"One of the difficulties that bishops expressed was the fact that at
times it wasn't always possible to get clear guidance from the Holy See
and there wasn't always a consistent approach within the different
Vatican departments," he said.

"Obviously, Rome is aware of this misinterpretation and the harm that
this has done, or could potentially do, to the trust that the people
have in how the church deals with these matters," he said.

An Irish government-authorized investigation into the scandal and cover
up harshly criticized the Vatican for its mixed messages and insistence
on secrecy in the 2001 directive and previous Vatican documents on the
topic.

"An obligation to secrecy/confidentialtiy on the part of participants in
a canonical process could undoubtedly constitute an inhibition on
reporting child sexual abuse to the civil authorities or others," it
concluded.

In the United States, Dan Shea, an attorney for several victims, has
introduced the Ratzinger letter in court as evidence that the church was
trying to obstruct justice. He has argued that the church impeded civil
reporting by keeping the cases secret and "reserving" them for the
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

"This is an international criminal conspiracy to obstruct justice," Shea
told The Associated Press.

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