VATICAN CITY – The Vatican is preparing to update the 2001
norms that deal with priestly sex abuse of minors, in effect
codifying practices that have been in place for several
years.
At the same time, it will include the “attempted ordination
of women” among the list of most serious crimes against
church law, or “delicta graviora,” sources said.
Sexual abuse of a minor by a priest was added to the
classification of “delicta graviora” in 2001. At that time
the Vatican established norms to govern the handling of such
cases.
The revisions of those norms have been in the pipeline for
some time and were expected to be published in mid-July,
Vatican sources said. While the changes are not
“earthshaking,” they will ultimately strengthen the church’s
efforts to identify and discipline priests who abuse minors,
the sources said.
The revisions will be published with ample documentation and
will be accompanied by a glossary of church law terms, aimed
at helping nonexperts understand the complex rules and
procedures that the Vatican has in place for dealing with sex
abuse allegations.
The revisions were expected to extend the church law’s
statute of limitations on accusations of sexual abuse, from
10 years after the alleged victim’s 18th birthday to 20
years. For several years, Vatican officials have been
routinely granting exceptions to the 10-year statute of
limitations.
The revisions also make it clear that use of child
pornography would fall under the category of clerical sexual
abuse of minors. In 2009, the Vatican determined that any
instance of a priest downloading child pornography from the
Internet would be a form of serious abuse that a bishop must
report to the doctrinal congregation, which oversees cases of
sexual abuse.
In addition, the revisions will make clear that abuse of
mentally disabled adults will be considered equivalent to
abuse of minors. In the law on the sexual abuse of minors,
the term “minors” will include “persons of who suffer from
permanent mental disability,” sources said.
When Pope John Paul II promulgated the norms on priestly sex
abuse in 2001, he gave the Congregation for the Doctrine of
the Faith juridical control over such cases.
The revisions incorporate changes made by Pope John Paul in
2003; those simplified some of the procedures and gave the
doctrinal congregation the power, in some “very grave and
clear cases,” to laicize without an ecclesiastical trial
priests who have sexually abused minors.
In April, the Vatican placed online a guide to understanding
the church’s provisions for sex abuse cases. That guide
mentioned the revisions under preparation and said those
revisions would not change the basic procedures already in
place.
The sources said the Vatican was not preparing to publish
other documents on priestly sex abuse. Although some have
argued that some of the strict sex abuse norms adopted by
U.S. bishops in 2002 should be universalized, the sources
said there was no imminent plan to do that.
Pope John Paul’s 2001 document distinguished between two
types of “most grave crimes,” those committed in the
celebration of the sacraments and those committed against
morals. Among the sacramental crimes were such things as
desecration of the Eucharist and violation of the seal of
confession.
Under the new revisions, the “attempted ordination of women”
will be listed among those crimes, as a serious violation of
the sacrament of holy orders, informed sources said. As such,
it will be handled under the procedures set up for
investigating “delicta graviora” under the control of the
doctrinal congregation.
In 2008, the doctrinal congregation formally decreed that a
woman who attempts to be ordained a Catholic priest and the
person attempting to ordain her are automatically
excommunicated. In 1994, Pope John Paul said the church’s ban
on women priests is definitive and not open to debate among
Catholics.
