The Bishops of Scotland are expected to commission an outside body to examine their child abuse files when they meet this week.It is understood that they will ask an independent academic expert to assess cases of clerical abuse in dioceses going back decades.
In a letter to The Tablet, the Archbishop Emeritus of Glasgow, Mario Conti, claimed that Cardinal Keith O'Brien had blocked a planned investigation into the files dating back 60 years when he was President of the Bishops' Conference of Scotland.
According to a spokesman Archbishop Conti was referring to a meeting of the bishops' conference in September 2012.
This week the Bishop Emeritus of Motherwell, Joseph Devine, said he believed that Cardinal O'Brien had blocked the review of his St Andrews and Edinburgh diocese's files because it might have uncovered something that "could prove very damning" for the Church, given that the review went back many years.
However, a church source has also been reported as saying that the cardinal was opposed to the project because he did not feel it was "rigorous enough".
Church sources said that because the academic study had already been agreed to by a majority of the bishops it was relatively straightforward for the process to be started again.
The bishops will also discuss whether to commission a wider inquiry into clerical sex abuse.