POPE - VATICAN..... AND SEX ABUSE!!

Pope defrocks 400 priests in 2 years for sex abuse

Getty Images: Christopher Furlong

Pope Benedict XVI, here blessing pilgrims for the last time as pontiff in February 2013, defrocked hundreds of priests for child molestation.

4 hr ago  By Nicole Winfield and John Heilprin of Associated Press

For the first time, the Vatican provided details on the number of priests defrocked for sexual abuse, prepared this year for questioning by the United Nations.

VATICAN CITY — A document obtained by The Associated Press on Friday shows Pope Benedict XVI defrocked nearly 400 priests over just two years for molesting children.

The statistics for 2011-12 show a dramatic increase over the 171 priests removed in 2008 and 2009, when the Vatican first provided details on the number of priests who have been defrocked. Prior to that, it had only publicly revealed the number of alleged cases of sexual abuse it had received.

The document was prepared from data the Vatican had been collecting to help the Holy See defend itself before a U.N. committee this week in Geneva.

Related: Vatican comes under criticism for sex abuse

Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, the Vatican's U.N. ambassador in Geneva, referred to just one of the statistics in the course of eight hours of oftentimes pointed criticism and questioning from the U.N. human rights committee.

The statistics were compiled from the Vatican's own annual reports about the activities of its various offices, including the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which handles sex abuse cases. Although public, the annual reports are not readily available or sold outside Rome and are usually found in Vatican offices or Catholic university libraries.

An AP review of the reference books shows a remarkable evolution in the Holy See's in-house procedures to discipline pedophiles since 2001, when the Vatican ordered bishops to send cases of all credibly accused priests to Rome for review.

Then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger took action after determining that bishops around the world weren't following church law to put accused clerics on trial in church tribunals. Bishops routinely moved problem priests from parish to parish rather than subject them to canonical trials — or turn them into police.

AP Photo

This copy of an internal Vatican document was used in the Thursday, Jan. 16, hearing before the UN committee monitoring the Vatican's implementation of the Convention for the Rights of the Child.

For centuries, the church has had its own in-house procedures to deal with priests who sexually abuse children. One of the chief accusations from victims is that bishops put the church's own procedures ahead of civil law enforcement by often suggesting victims not go to police and keep accusations quiet while they are dealt with internally.

The maximum penalty for a priest convicted by a church tribunal is essentially losing his job: being defrocked, or removed from the clerical state. There are no jail terms and nothing to prevent an offender from raping again.

According to the 2001 norms Ratzinger pushed through, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith reviews each case sent to Rome and then instructs bishops how to proceed, either by launching an administrative process against the priest if the evidence is overwhelming or a church trial. At every step of the way the priest is allowed to defend himself.

The Congregation started reporting numbers only in 2005, which is where Tomasi's spreadsheet starts off. U.N. officials said Friday that the committee has not received the document.

Heilprin reported from Geneva.

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THE  PREVIOUS  POPE  ADMITTED  THERE  IS  NO  BIBLICAL  COMMAND  FOR  PRIESTS  NOT  TO  MARRY;  BUT  ALSO  SAID  NO  CHANGE  IN  TEACHING  WAS FORTHCOMING,  AS  BEING  SINGLE  GIVES  MORE  TIME  FOR  PRIESTS  TO  DEVOTE  THEMSELVES  TO  SERVING  THE  PEOPLE  ETC.

IT  IS  A  CRAZY  DOCTRINE  TO  CONTINUE;  ONLY  THE  VERY  FEW  MEN  ARE  GIVEN  THE  GIFT  TO  BE  HAPPY  AND  TO  FUNCTION  WELL,  IN  THE  MINISTRY,  AND  NOT  BE  MARRIED.  SEE  WHAT  JESUS  TAUGHT  IN  MATTHEW  19:10-12.

FROM  WHAT  WE  CAN  GATHER  IN  THE  WRITINGS  OF  THE  NEW  TESTAMENT,  IT  WOULD  SEEM  THE  APOSTLE  PAUL  DURING  HIS  CHRISTIAN  MINISTRY  WAS  NOT  MARRIED [HE  MAY  HAVE  BEEN  BEFORE,  WE  ARE  NOT  TOLD].  

IF  THE  ROMAN  CATHOLIC  CHURCH  HAD  ALWAYS  HAD  MARRIED  PRIESTS,  THE  SEXUAL  ABUSE  BY  PRIESTS  WOULD  HAVE  BEEN  ALWAYS  VERY  SMALL.  DOES  NOT  MEAN  LIMITED  ENTIRELY,  AS  SOME  LEADERS  IN  THE  CHRISTIAN  MINISTRY  HAVE  FALLEN  PREY  TO  ADULTERY  AND/OR  OTHER  IMMORAL  SEXUAL  SINS,  IN  MANY  "DENOMINATIONS."

THE  NEW  RECENT  POPE  WITH  HIS  NEW  APPROACH,  SHOULD  INDEED  ABOLISH  THIS  UN-MARRIED  PRIESTHOOD  DOCTRINE,  ESPECIALLY  AS  IT  HAS  NO  AUTHORITY  FROM  THE  BIBLE;  BUT....DO  NOT  HOLD  YOUR  BREATH  THAT IT  WILL  BE  CHANGED.  TIME  WILL  TELL.

Keith Hunt