The U.S. Roman Catholic Church has made a strong response to the child sex abuse scandal although it must not relax its vigilance, an oversight panel said in a five-year report card issued on Thursday. Critics said the crisis is far from over, many offenders remain unpunished and there is still a lack of accountability.
Judge Michael Merz, a federal magistrate in Dayton, Ohio, who heads the National Review Board, formed five years ago by the U.S. bishops, said the group commended the bishops for a strong response so far but "efforts for prevention, healing, and vigilance will be demanded for the rest of our days."
"The price of this crime is steep both in the pain felt by victims and the shadow cast on the reputation of innocent Catholic priests. Most priests never have abused a child or even someone's trust in them, but they bear shame by association," he added.
The abuse and cover-up scandal erupted in Boston in 2002 and has spread to nearly every U.S. diocese, triggering suits and settlements, the biggest in the Los Angeles Archdiocese, which agreed in July to pay $660 million to 508 victims.
The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests issued a statement on Thursday saying it still sees no accountability and asked the Vatican to move against a number of bishops it said were implicated in wrongdoing.
'CONSIDERABLE PAIN REMAINS'
Boston-based Voice of the Faithful, a Catholic lay group formed after the scandal to push for reforms, said it would hold a vigil in that city on Thursday, the fifth anniversary of the resignation of Cardinal Bernard Law. Law, the most senior Roman Catholic official in the United States, left the Boston post in disgrace over his handling of clergy sexual abuse.
"Virtually none of the hundreds of church officials all over this country who covered up child sex crimes have been held accountable in any way", said Robert Ott, President of the Boston Area Voice of the Faithful Council.
"Despite Cardinal Law's resignation, and the suspension of hundreds of accused abusive clerics, (we) are convinced that considerable pain remains to be ameliorated and extensive work needs to be done to both protect the vulnerable and heal the wounded, inside and outside the Catholic Church."
As of last year 98 percent of U.S. dioceses and other jurisdictions were participating in audits and those that have been concluded show "full compliance" with standards the bishops established in 2002, the review board's report said.
More than 6 million children have been through programs to help them identify wrongdoing and 1.6 million background investigations have taken place, it said.
The panel was encouraging the bishops to perform random audits of parishes. The report also urged church officials to speed how allegations of abuse are checked out for credibility, and said the church needs to examine what its appropriate role is in supervising offenders.
While most priests have not been involved in abuse many feel "alienated from both the bishops and the laity," the report said.
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