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Pope Meets With Irish Bishops Over Sex Abuse Scandal

By Howard M. Friedman

The Vatican yesterday issued a statement (full text) after Pope Benedict XVI's two-day summit with Irish bishops on the priest sex abuse scandal in that country. The Murphy Commission Report issued last year faulted the Church's handling of abuse cases for 30 years ending in 2004.(See prior related posting.) Both The Pilot and Zenit yesterday reported on the meetings and their aftermath. According to the Vatican, the Pope "challenged the Bishops to address the problems of the past with determination and resolve, and to face the present crisis with honesty and courage. He also expressed the hope that the present meeting would help to unify the Bishops and enable them to speak with one voice in identifying concrete steps aimed at bringing healing to those who had been abused, encouraging a renewal of faith in Christ and restoring the Church?s spiritual and moral credibility."

Meanwhile a new controversy broke out over the refusal by Archbishop Giuseppe Leanza, the Vatican's apostolic nuncio to Ireland, to appear before the Irish parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee. According to yesterday's Irish Times, the nuncio in a letter to the Oireachtas committee said: "it is not the practice of the Holy See that apostolic nuncios appear before parliamentary commissions."

Full post as published by Religion Clause on February 17, 2010 (boomark / email).