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NORMS-HERRANZ
Aug-7-2003 (450 words) xxxi
Vatican official says 1962 norms on solicitation no longer apply
By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The
Vatican's 1962 norms for handling cases of priests
accused of soliciting sex in the confessional have been
superseded by the 1983 Code of Canon Law and new 2001
norms for dealing with serious crimes involving the
sacraments, said the Vatican's top canon law official.
Archbishop Julian Herranz, president of the
Pontifical Council for the Interpretation of Legislative
Texts, told reporters Aug. 7, "When a matter is
re-ordered, the previous procedures are suspended."
The archbishop was asked about the status of a
1962 doctrinal congregation "Instruction on the Manner
of Proceeding in Cases of Solicitation," a term that
refers specifically to sexual misconduct suggested or
carried out by a priest in the context of offering
sacramental confession.
An attorney for victims
of clerical sex abuse submitted the document to a
Massachusetts court in late July, claiming it proved a
Vatican-ordered conspiracy to cover up cases of sex
abuse over the past 40 years.
News stories about
the document in the Massachusetts press in July and
nationally in August portrayed it as an instruction to
bishops to keep every accusation of clerical sex abuse
secret.
The document insists that the
investigation of allegations of solicitation in the
confessional and the trials of accused priests be
conducted in absolute secrecy; however, if a priest was
found guilty or simply "admonished" for unsuitable
behavior and later was transferred to another diocese,
the bishop was obliged to inform the bishop of the new
diocese.
A Vatican official, who asked not to be
identified, said Aug. 7 the document's invocation of
secrecy was not meant to protect guilty priests, but to
ensure a fair trial and safeguard the reputations of
innocent priests and of the penitent making the claim.
Msgr. Francis Maniscalco, spokesman for the U.S.
bishops' conference, said the document "deals with
crimes against the sacrament" throughout the universal
church and "is totally silent with regard to civil
crimes."
In fact, he said, the document
considers solicitation to be "so serious that a person
is required to denounce the priest, and the result can
be that the priest is removed from ministry."
Even a priest guilty of attempting to solicit
sex from a penitent is "burdened seriously in
conscience" to inform his victim that he or she has 30
days to report the incident to the bishop or face
excommunication, the 1962 document said.
To
prevent the violation of the sacramental relationship
from remaining "occult and unpunished and always with
inestimable detriment to souls," the document said, the
victim must be compelled to report the crime or to
inform a trusted person who would report the crime.
END
Copyright (c) 2003 Catholic News Service/U.S.
Conference of Catholic Bishops. The CNS news report may
not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise
distributed, including but not limited to such means as
framing or any other digital copying or distribution
method, in whole or in part without the prior written
authority of Catholic News Service. | | | |
