VATICAN CITY (CNS) 
-- Pope John Paul II, responding to recent revelations of sexual abuse by clergy, said the perpetrators of such scandals have betrayed the priesthood and cast a "shadow of suspicion" over the many good priests of the world.
The Pope said the Church was concerned for the victims of such abuse and wants to handle each case "in truth and justice." At the same time he asked for prayers to reawaken the spiritual ideals of the priesthood.
The Pope's words came at the end of a 19-page Holy Thursday letter to all priests, made public March 21 [2002].
At a press conference the same day to present the Pope's text, Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos strongly defended the Church's handling of abuse cases, saying the Church has "never neglected the problem of sexual abuse, even before it ended up on the front pages of international newspapers."
... Most of the publicised cases have been in the United States, but allegations also have surfaced in France, Ireland, Poland and other countries.
*** He noted that in 2001 the Pope had strengthened the Vatican's role in handling such cases, reserving them to the authority of the Vatican's doctrinal congregation.
At the same time, he said, the Vatican lengthened the statute of limitations for such crimes to 10 years, a period that begins after an alleged victim's 18th birthday; it also raised the Church's legal definition of a minor from 16 to 18 in such cases.
... "The laws of the Church are serious and severe and have been drawn up in a tradition ... of dealing with internal matters in an internal way," Cardinal Castrillon said.
... Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said Cardinal Castrillon's comments could be considered an expression of the Church's position on the issue.
The Pope's letter and the cardinal's statement were the Vatican's most extensive published comments on the issue since the trial of a Boston priest in January [2002] sparked a rash of revelations about past cases of clerical sex abuse in several U.S. dioceses.
In early March, Bishop Anthony J. O'Connell of Palm Beach resigned after admitting to sexual misconduct with a minor 25 years ago.
In Poland, Archbishop Juliusz Paetz of Poznan -- who worked for years at the Vatican -- was accused of sexual impropriety by seminarians; he has denied the accusations, but the Vatican is investigating.
In Ireland in January, the country's Conference of Religious agreed to pay $110 million to Irish children who were sexually abused in Church-run schools from
1940-1970. More than 20 priests, brothers and nuns already have been convicted of abusing children.
... Cardinal Castrillon ... declined to comment on the issues of priestly celibacy and homosexuality, which some have seen as related to the question of sex abuse.
Last November, in a document on the Church in Oceania, the Pope issued a Church apology to the victims of clerical sexual abuse. ...