While pleased that the Catholic Church is taking the problem
of pedophilia seriously, an international panel of experts told Vatican
officials that dismissing every priest guilty of sexually abusing a minor is
not the way to handle the problem.
Eight internationally recognized psychiatric and medical experts were invited
to lead an April 2-5 symposium at the Vatican.
The Pontifical Academy for Life, which often sponsors scientific conferences on
medical and ethical topics, organized the meeting. It was attended by officials
from the Vatican Secretariat of State and the congregations for doctrine,
clergy, Catholic education, religious and bishops. Several priests and nuns
directly involved in treating offenders also were invited; they included Father
Stephen Rossetti, president of St. Luke Institute in Silver Spring, Md., and
Franciscan Father Canice Connors, president of the U.S. Conference of Major
Superiors of Men and former president of St. Luke's.
The eight experts, none of whom are Catholic, came from Germany, the United
States and Canada. Several of them had presented papers at the 2002
international conference of the Association for the Treatment of Sexual
Abusers, which was attended by a psychiatrist who is a member of the Pontifical
Council for the Laity.
According to participants at the Vatican meeting, the experts criticized
"zero tolerance" policies for all priests who had ever sexually
abused a minor. Such policies, they said, ignore the difficulty of determining
the future risk posed by the offender and may actually increase the risk.
The experts said that "by letting them go, you may be unleashing them on
the general public" without the supervision and support systems that may
have helped them control their negative behavior, said a Vatican participant
who did not want to be named. Dismissal also may increase stress, which is
another risk factor.
The participant said the experts told Vatican officials that banning
homosexuals from the priesthood would not solve the problem because although
homosexuality is one of many "risk factors" it is not the cause of
pedophilia.
He said he hoped the experts' remarks would quash a proposal being studied by
the Congregation for Catholic Education to discourage the admittance of
homosexual men into seminaries; the congregation is responsible for seminaries
as well as Catholic schools.
Dr. Martin P. Kafka, a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and
president of the Massachusetts chapter of the Association for the Treatment of
Sexual Abusers, was the only U.S. expert invited.
Kafka, who gave presentations on the sexual molestation of adolescents and on
the possibility of treating sexual offenders with pharmaceuticals, said he
believes the U.S. bishops' policy of dismissing every offender from the
priesthood "is a real mistake."
"It is only in the United States that that policy has been taken," he
said, while in Europe and Canada provisions have been made to allow some
offenders to continue in the priesthood while excluding all contact with
minors.
"Many of these men are not your typical sex offenders," he said; they
have only one or two victims, their crime involved "above clothing
molestation" and the incidents occurred 15 to 30 years ago.
"With treatment and supervision, you can help those perpetrators," he
told Catholic
News Service.
"You cannot cover up the problem, and changes must be made" in the
way the church handles the cases, "but each case must be dealt with
individually and you must see who is motivated for treatment."
Kafka said the key issue in Catholic seminaries is whether or not students have
a mature understanding of their own sexuality.
"Data suggests that the overwhelming majority of adult men who molest
children -- boys or girls -- are heterosexual," he said. "With the
molestation of adolescent boys, the incidence of adult male homosexuality is
higher, but it is not one to one."
Homosexuality is just one of many risk factors, he said, and the fact that
"most adult male homosexuals do not molest children or adolescents"
means homosexuals should not be banned from the priesthood out of fear they may
molest someone.
Another Vatican participant said a key point made by the experts confirmed the
general stance taken by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which
is that instances of clerical sexual abuse must be dealt with on a case-by-case
basis.
"There are cases which demand the dismissal from the clerical state
because he is using his office to abuse," the participant said.
When a priest is dismissed, however, the church should ensure that other means
exist for keeping the priest under observation, he said. Such means include
state-mandated registries of sex offenders.
Dr. Jorg M. Fegert, medical director of the pediatric psychiatric clinic at the
University of Ulm, Germany, said he was the only expert invited to discuss the
impact of sexual abuse on children.
"I made a plea for a careful discussion of the responsibility toward the
victims," he told CNS. "It is important not just to look at what to
do with priests, but to ensure the children get help."
Fegert, who has worked with child victims of sexual abuse for the past 10
years, told Vatican officials that in cases where the abuse is reported
"the children undergo an average of five to seven interrogations and
interviews by police and psychologists, which can traumatize them even
more."
"We must develop procedures to protect children while trying to get the
truth," he said.
Fegert said that although he is not a Catholic, in the wake of the U.S. sex
abuse scandal, he had written to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, head of the
doctrinal congregation, telling him, "It is important not only to have
policies for priests, but to learn from the scientific studies and to care for
the children."
"There will be a number of priests who were abused as children," he
said. "If you offer help to the child victims, maybe you can prevent some
abuse in the future."