THE head of the Catholic Church in South Africa, Cardinal Wilfred Napier, says some local priests found guilty of sexual abuse are allowed, and continue to serve, albeit “under very strict supervision”.
This comes in the week that United States cardinals and Vatican officials met in Rome to discuss the series of sex scandals involving priests that have rocked the US Catholic Church.
The leadership of the US Catholic Church stands accused of a cover-up by “shifting” the offending priests to different parishes instead of handing them over to the law.
Addressing the opening session of the Rome meeting, Pope John Paul II said there was “no place” in religious life for those who would harm young people.
But Napier says some South African priests who have been found guilty of sex abuse continue to minister, adding that this was “strictly controlled”.
He said that in terms of the church’s “protocols” on dealing with sex abuse, “paedophilia is a pathological condition, not curable, but treatable in some cases”, meaning that after “specialised treatment” and follow-ups, including work with “skilled therapists”, a return to the ministry was possible.
Speaking on the SABC’s AM Live programme, Napier said the local Catholic Church had seen “at the most, about 10 cases in the past 10 years” of sexual abuse of women and children by priests, adding that owing to the absence of a database of cases, the figures were unclear. He said that he personally knew of cases where offending priests had returned to parish life.
Asked why the church dealt with the complaints internally (as the US Church has done) and did not hand the suspects over to the law, Napier said that in many cases complainants themselves did not want the matter taken to the law but reported the abuse “mainly to ensure it won’t happen again to another child”.
The Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference this week released its “protocols”, in terms of which any action to be taken against a guilty priest is at the discretion of his bishop and/ or religious superior.
“One of the strengths of the protocol is that the people who do the interview [for an investigation] have to inform the complainant that they have the option of going to the law,” Napier says.
Napier’s comments have been criticised as “very disappointing” by organisations lobbying for a greater liberalisation of the Catholic Church.
Diana Cormick, who heads Women’s Ordination South Africa (Wosa) and is also a member of the international organisation “We are Church”, last year wrote a letter to Napier, asking him to use his influence to “urgently make an apology for the sins of sexual abuse of Southern African women and girls by some members of the clergy”.
Cormick says Napier’s comments are disappointing because they “said nothing about the victims” and “have more to do with protecting the image of the Church”.
“He’s stonewalling, using vague reassurances: we want them to acknowledge it’s happening, and to know exactly what they’re doing about it,” she says.
“The real issue is the church’s wrong teachings on human sexuality, on the ordination of women, on the use of condoms, everything,” Cormick says.