The Vatican has confirmed the authenticity of a letter in which a cardinal praised a French bishop for not denouncing a paedophile priest.
The letter, originally published in the French press, was written in 2001 by Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos, then in charge of clergy around the world.
A Vatican spokesman said the letter showed the wisdom of a 2001 decision to centralise the handling of abuse cases.
The case comes amid a continuing child sex abuse scandal engulfing the Church.
Allegations of abuse and cover-ups have emerged recently from countries across Europe as well as the US.
The letter from Cardinal Hoyos was addressed to the bishop of Bayeux-Lisieux in northern France, Pierre Pican.
Father Pican had just been given a three-month suspended prison sentence for not denouncing Rene Bissey, an abbott who was sentenced to 18 years in prison in 2000 for paedophilia.
'Delighted'
"I congratulate you on not having spoken out to civil authorities against a priest," wrote Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos, who at the time was prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy.
Bishop Pierre Pican reveived a three-month suspended sentence
"You have done well and I am delighted to have an associate in the episcopate who... preferred prison to speaking out against a son-priest."
Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said the letter confirmed "how opportune it was to centralise treatment of cases of sexual abuse of minors by clerics under the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith".
That step was taken in 2001 by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger - now Pope Benedict XVI - who headed the the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the time.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8624763.stmThe Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) (Congregatio pro Doctrina Fidei), previously known as the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition, and sometimes simply called the Holy Office, is the oldest of the nine congregations of the Roman Curia. Among the most active of the congregations, it oversees Catholic doctrine.
Recent opinions and publications
Dominus Iesus (2000)
Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons (2002)<4>
<5> (24 November 2002), arguably the basis for the comments by Cardinal George Pell and those by Archbishop Barry Hickey in June 2007 in Australia to Catholic politicians on their votes on therapeutic cloning legislation.
In an April 2007 address to chaplains, Archbishop Amato denounced same-sex marriage and abortion and criticized the Italian media's coverage of them, saying that they are evils "that remain almost invisible" due to media presentation of them as "expression of human progress."<6>
On September 28, 2007, Gaston Hebert, the then apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Little Rock stated that (per the July 11 Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) 6 Arkansas nuns were excommunicated for heresy (the first in the diocese's 165-year history). They refused to recant the doctrines of the Community of the Lady of All Nations (Army of Mary). The 6 nuns are members of the Good Shepherd Monastery of Our Lady of Charity and Refuge in Hot Springs. Sister Mary Theresa Dionne, 82, one of 6, said they will still live at the convent property, which they own. The sect believe that its 86-year-old founder, Marie Paule Giguere, is the reincarnation of the Virgin Mary.<7>
On April 5, 2008, as a result of "grave reservations" by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith about the Mormon practice of posthumous rebaptism, Catholic dioceses throughout the world were directed not to give information in parish registers to the Mormons' Genealogical Society of Utah for microfilming or digitizing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_delictis_gravioribushttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Benedict_XVIhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congregation_for_the_Doctrine_of_the_Faith
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