U.S. bishops scuttle mandatory "child protection" policy.

Washington, DC -- In a little-noticed, single paragraph released May 15, 2006 on its website, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops reversed the policy adopted by numerous dioceses across America that had subjected Catholic schoolchildren to mandatory "sex-abuse-education" classes. "New regulations issued May 15 by the U.S. bishops allow parents to remove their children from diocesan-sponsored training programs in child sex-abuse prevention," said the announcement from the U.S. bishops' Catholic News Service (CNS).

The reversal confirms the error of those bishops and chancery bureaucrats across the country who routinely forced families to withdraw their children from Catholic schools when they objected to mandatory sex-education classes for children as young as kindergarten. After the eruption of the clerical sex-abuse scandals five years ago, American bishops met in Dallas and adopted a charter that required the introduction of "sex-abuse education" programs.

Thereupon, chanceries turned to secular "sex-abuse" experts to run their "safe environment" programs. These "experts" quickly introduced "sex-abuse education" programs that ignored the homosexual crimes that had caused the scandals, redirecting to the laity the blame for sex abuse. That approach reflected the anti-Catholic views of the "Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transsexual, and Questioning" (GLBTQ) activists.

As reported by The Wanderer (May 18, 2006), most of the "safe environment" programs mandated by the USCCB repeat the party line of the GLBTQ rights community that "Homosexual rape is not the problem, homophobia is."

After the charter was adopted, Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, Archbishop of Washington, D.C., became a leader in the campaign to impose programs and requirements on the laity. His archdiocesan officials insisted that the clerical aspect of the scandals was a thing of the past. In the spring of 2002, Auxiliary Bishop Kevin Farrell flatly told a group of prominent Catholic laymen that the crisis was "over."

Comment:

Today some people wonder whether there is a connection between the retirement of Cardinal McCarrick, 75, in mid-May, and the issuing of the new regulations. Cardinal McCarrick's letter of resignation was accepted by Pope Benedict on May 16, 2006. His successor is Bishop Donald Wuerl of Pittsburgh, 65.

Be that as it may, what still needs to be done is one of two things: close down the program altogether, or rewrite it from a genuinely Catholic perspective.