Campaigners for the better protection of children from abuse by Roman Catholic priests are questioning the accuracy of figures presented in the latest annual report from the National Catholic Safeguarding Commission (NCSC) launched last week (28 July 2011) by the Shadow Attorney General, Baroness Scotland of Asthal (1). Table 6 of the NCSC report for 2010 asserts that ‘laicisation’ (dismissal from the clerical state) has been “completed” in the cases of 23 ‘diocesan’ priests convicted of offences against children, since 2001. However, author of the weblog ‘Concerned About Abuse in the Catholic Church in England and Wales’ (2), Philip Gilligan (3), says that this claim is not consistent with either the figures previously published by the Church nor with what Baroness Scotland had told him as recently as 27 June 2011 (4).
Philip Gilligan said:
“The numbers simply do not add-up and it appears that the authors of this latest report have included several cases where the process of laicisation has not, in fact, been “completed” and a decision is, in fact, still awaited from the Vatican. This is, at best, misleading and especially, in the context of recent news from the Diocese of Cloyne in Ireland, tends only to increase concerns that the Church’s approach to matters involving the abuse of children by its clergy lacks honesty and openness. The general public and the laity within the Church would do well to question whether they can trust the accuracy of what they are now being told by the NCSC.
Last month, Baroness Scotland, chair of the NCSC wrote to me saying ‘We have recently looked at the cases of 34 priests convicted of offences since 2001 which resulted in prison sentences. ...23 have either been dismissed from the clerical state or the process of dismissal has commenced.’ Now she has launched a report which claims that laicisation has been “completed” in the cases of 23 diocesan priests.
More, alarmingly, the five annual reports from the now defunct Catholic Office for the Protection of Children and Vulnerable Adults (COPCA)(5) recorded a total of only 5 laicisations between 2003 and 2007 (two in 2003, two in 2004, none in 2005, none in 2006 and one in 2007). The equivalent annual reports for 2008 and 2009 from the NCSC (6) gave no information about the number of laicisations, but the director of the Catholic Safeguarding Advisory Service (CSAS), Adrian Child, told me by e-mail in July 2010 that one further relevant priest had been laicised in 2008 (7). Thus, the total number of relevant laicisations previously reported by COPCA / NCSC / CSAS amounted to only 6, while the latest NCSC report says that 2 laicisations of diocesan priests were “completed” in 2010. If my arithmetic is correct, this brings the apparent total to only 8. Hence, I am left asking: Who are the other 15 priests included in the most recent report from the NCSC? When were their laicisations ‘completed’? Are these, in fact, cases where ‘the process of dismissal has commenced’, but has not, in fact, been ‘completed’?”
“For those of us continuing to monitor implementation of what the Church has promised to do in relation to the abuse of children by Catholic priests, two straightforward questions need answering, as soon as possible by Baroness Scotland: How many Catholic priests in England and Wales have been convicted of offences against children, since the Bishops adopted the recommendations of the Nolan committee report in November 2001? How many of these convicted priests had been dismissed from the clerical state by the Vatican under canon 290, by the end of 2010?”
Notes:
(1) See http://www.catholic-ew.org.uk/Catholic-Church/Media-Centre/Press-Releases/Press-Releases-2011/Safeguarding-Annual-Report-2010-11
(2) See http://caaccew.blogspot.com/
(3) Philip Gilligan is a senior
lecturer in the Division of Social Work at the University of Bradford.
He is joint author of the book Religion, Belief and Social Work
published by Policy Press, Bristol in 2010.
(4) A copy of the letter
is available at http://caaccew.blogspot.com/2011/07/letter-received-from-chair-of-national.html
(5) Copies available via http://www.csas.uk.net/
(6) Copy available at http://www.catholicsafeguarding.org.uk/documents.htm
(7) Copy of e-mail and statistics referred to are available to blog readers on request from philipgilligan@lineone.net.
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