Sexual abuse by Catholic priests – Next steps

There was a lot to learn from the release last Friday of reports on clergy sexual abuse in the American Catholic Church. The much anticipated document from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York stated that 4,392 priests (4 percent of the U.S. total) sexually victimized 10,667 children during the past 52 years. The report noted that 81 percent of the victims were boys, with two-thirds being teenagers. Most of the abuse occurred in the 1970s (70 percent of the offending priests were ordained on or before 1970), with significant declines by the 1980s and 1990s. In a separate report also commissioned by American Catholic bishops, the National Review Board for the Protection of Children and Young People, composed of lay persons, chastised the bishops for how they dealt with child-abuse allegations over the years