'Pushing the boundaries': Church loses track of abusive priests

By Chris Vedelago, Beau Donelly, Cameron Houston, May 7, 2016, The Age, Victoria

The Catholic Church is allowing paedophile priests to live anonymously in the community with limited supervision and has ignored warnings about their misconduct.

The Sunday Age can also reveal one of Victoria's top Catholic officials, Bishop Les Tomlinson, has conducted mass alongside a priest banned from public ministry for committing acts of sexual abuse.

An investigation into the Melbourne archdiocese's program for managing sex offenders within its ranks has found:

  • The church is uncertain how many abusive priests are under its supervision
  • No written policy for managing sex offenders exists despite the church identifying dozens of predator priests since the start of the Melbourne response victim compensation scheme in 1996
  • Priests who have left the church's jurisdiction without permission or ignore directives from superiors about their conduct are still being financially supported and protected
  • Parishioners are unaware priests have been banned from public ministry for sexual misconduct because the information is being withheld or removed

A spokesman for the Melbourne archdiocese said risk assessments were conducted for each priest found  . . .

Read full article here


Showing 1 comment

SNAP Network is a GuideStar Gold Participant