‘No place’ for molesters

The Washington Post and Associated Press

VATICAN CITY — Pope John Paul II told a gathering of U.S. cardinals Tuesday that there is "no place" for child molesters in the priesthood, but one of the cardinals attending the emergency meeting said the pope may have left some leeway for wayward priests who repent and undergo treatment to resume their ministry — as long as they had no contact with children.

Opening a two-day meeting, the pope said child sexual abuse not only was "rightly considered a crime by society," but also was "an appalling sin in the eyes of God." To the victims and their families, he said, "I express my profound sense of solidarity and concern."

It was the pope’s most forceful condemnation of priestly sexual misconduct since the scandal erupted in Boston in January, the first time he has spoken of it as a crime and the closest he has come to an apology to victims.

But the speech provided little concrete guidance for the 12 U.S. cardinals and three top officials of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops who were summoned here to produce a unified response.

Cardinal Francis George of Chicago said it was unclear from the pope’s remarks whether the Vatican favors a "one-strike-you’re-out" policy.

At one point in his speech, John Paul said "there is no place in the priesthood and religious life for those who would harm the young." But at another point, he admonished the cardinals not to forget "the power of Christian conversion, that radical decision to turn away from sin and back to God, which reaches to the depths of a person’s soul and can work extraordinary change."

John Paul did not castigate the American bishops. Rather, he seemed to exonerate them, saying that "a generalized lack of knowledge of the nature of the problem and also at times the advice of clinical experts led bishops to make decisions which subsequent events showed to be wrong."

Until recent years, the bishops have said, they viewed pedophilia not as an incurable illness, but as a moral problem that could be addressed by repentance and psychotherapy. Victims and their lawyers contend that the bishops should long ago have recognized the need to remove sex offenders from regular contact with children.

Cardinal Adam Maida of Detroit said behavioral scientists think "it’s not truly a pedophilia type problem but a homosexual type problem." He said bishops need to "cope with and address" the extent of a homosexual element in Catholic seminaries.

The meetings are scheduled to end today with the issuing of a communique.