Hot on HuffPost:

See More Stories

MAIL
- You might also like:
- News,
- Politics
- and More

Sphere

News
Web

Main
Nation
World
Business
Entertainment
Sports
Politics
Health
Weird
Good
More
- Crime
- Tech
- Science
- Meet Our Team
- About Us
Help & Feedback

World

Vatican: Letter to Ireland's Bishops on Abuse Was Misunderstood

Jan 19, 2011 – 7:02 AM

Text Size

VATICAN CITY -- The Vatican says a letter warning Irish bishops against reporting sexual abuse of children to police has been misunderstood.

The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said that with its 1997 letter, the Vatican wanted to ensure that Irish bishops follow church law precisely so that pedophile priests would not have any technical grounds to escape church punishment.

Lombardi issued the statement Wednesday after The Associated Press reported that the letter from the Holy See's top diplomat in Ireland told bishops that their "mandatory reporting" of abuse policy "gives rise to serious reservations of both a moral and a canonical nature."

Ireland's top prelate had recommended in 1996 that bishops report known or suspected abuse to police.

Filed under: World

Tagged: catholic, catholic bishops, catholic church, catholic church sex abuse, federico lombardi, ireland, irish abuse scandal, irish priests, vatican

Follow AOL News on Facebook and Twitter.

2011 AOL Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. The information contained in the AP news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press. Active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL.