Acta Apostolicae Sedis - Commentarium Officiale684

his Dáil speech of 20 July 2011 and in the motion passed by Dáil Éireann on

the same day and by Seanad Éireann a week later. It also provides a more

complete account of the Church's legislation on child sexual abuse than

that described in the Cloyne Report, and states clearly the Holy See's view

regarding cooperation between Church and civil authorities.

1. Issues regarding the Holy See raised by the Cloyne Report

Having carefully examined the content of the Cloyne Report, the Holy See

concludes that the criticisms and accusations made against it are based pri-

marily on the Report's assessment of the letter addressed to the members of

the Irish Bishops' Conference on 31 January 1997 by the then Apostolic

Nuncio, Archbishop Luciano Storero, concerning the response of the Congre-

gation for the Clergy to the 1996 document entitled Child Sexual Abuse:

Framework for a Church Response, generally known as the Framework Docu-

ment. This letter is quoted extensively in the earlier Dublin Report (7.13-7.14)

and was the object of considerable public attention in January 2011. The

Holy See acknowledges, moreover, that, taken out of context, the letter could

be open to misinterpretation, giving rise to understandable criticism. In what

follows, an explanation of that context is offered, including, crucially, expla-

nation of the knowledge that the letter presupposes of the workings of the

Church and the relationship between episcopal conferences and the Holy See.

The Cloyne Report quotes the text of Archbishop Storero's letter and

offers an assessment. In chapter 1 the Report quotes excerpts from the letter

to the effect that the Congregation for the Clergy informed the Bishops that

the document in question was "not an official document of the Episcopal Con-

ference but merely a study document" and that it contained "procedures and

dispositions which appear contrary to canonical discipline and which, if applied,

could invalidate the acts of the same Bishops who are attempting to put a stop to

these problems. If such procedures were to be followed by the Bishops and there

were cases of eventual hierarchical recourse lodged at the Holy See, the results

could be highly embarrassing and detrimental to those same Diocesan authorities.

In particular, the situation of 'mandatory reporting' gives rise to serious reserva-

tions of both a moral and canonical nature" (1.18).

The Commission states its view that "This effectively gave individual Irish

bishops the freedom to ignore the procedures which they had agreed and gave

comfort and support to those who, like Monsignor O'Callaghan, dissented from