You'll see from these notes that our efforts to discover what's really going on are hampered by the bishops' refusal to provide consistent, complete, and verifiable information about crimes committed by Church personnel.  Since we are no match for the Church's multi-million dollar PR machine, we can only appeal to journalists to think twice before buying into the bishops' rendition of the crisis they created and long to put behind them.

p. 16 of pdf file

The bishops failed to explain why CARA did not collect data for 2003 or, if it did collect this data, why they decided to keep the numbers under wraps.  In addition, throughout this document, the bishops repeatedly insist that the Gavin Group auditors examined allegations received during 2003.  However, since totals are missing from the audit reports, we can only conclude that counting these allegations went beyond the auditors' mandate.

Clearly, since virtually every diocese keeps track of the number of allegations received each year, collecting and publishing the totals for 2003 along with those for 2004 would have been a simple process.  Indeed, if the bishops are, as they have repeatedly pledged, committed to keeping the public informed about the magnitude of the crisis, it's hard to imagine any justification for withholding this data.

p. 17 of pdf file

Although this passage suggests that the compliance audit process uncovered information about allegations received during the audit period, information about these allegations was not included in the individual audit reports.  Moreover, in contrast to the CARA survey, which focused only on 2004, the Gavin Group auditors were supposed to focus only on 2003, so it's not clear how the auditors could have gathered data relevant to the number of allegations received during the following year.

Moreover, since many dioceses have refused to  announce new accusations as a matter of policy, it's not clear how "public sources" could have been used to verify data.

And since there are numerous public interest and academic groups who would be eager to conduct an external record review, we don't know why this verification of the data "was not feasible."

p. 17 of pdf file

Although the Office of Child & Youth Protection repeatedly invited victims and advocates to submit information about Charter violations, all of the information that these people provided was uniformly ignored.

And unless there is some sort of central list of victims' names, it's hard to imagine how the Gavin Group "randomly" selected victims, or how the audit teams located them if identifying information was not provided by each diocese.

p. 17 of .pdf file

Again, the report seems to imply that the auditors collected specific information about allegations received during 2003, but either did not bother to count them or omitted these totals from the executive summaries prepared for each diocese.

p. 18 of pdf file

 Actually, the standards used by the auditors could not have been the same as those commonly used in secular organizations because auditors and investigators of those organizations normally have the power to compel staff members and other personnel to provide information, especially in relation to possible criminal activity.

The auditors in this case could not require anything of the Church hierarchy; compliance with the Bishops' Charter is entirely voluntary, and there are no penalties for failure to comply.  There is, in other words, a substantial difference between standards enforced in public schools and what is or is not permitted within the authoritarian structure of the Catholic Church.

It would certainly be useful to know if any of these 622 abusers were identified by any of the thousands of priests and parishioners who have reportedly undergone training to detect incidences of sexual abuse.

Given the alleged transformation in Church culture, one might expect to see at least one case in which an abuser was actually detected and reported by Church personnel.  And it would also be interesting to know if, in contrast to all previous history, any Church official responded to allegations by immediately calling the police.

It would likewise be helpful to find out if the Church is keeping track of the effectiveness of its newly instituted policies and programs by collecting statistics on the results of outreach and training, especially since these measures can be reduced to nothing but legal window dressing: bad for actually detecting or preventing abuse, but good for institutions that are trying to defend against lawsuits.

p. 20 of pdf file

As noted by SNAP and other advocacy groups, this audit report seems to contain a new category: priests who remain in active ministry after complaints have been brought against them.  Previously, in most dioceses, priests were supposed to be temporarily removed from service pending the completion of a preliminary investigation.  Now it seems that removal does not occur until some sort of undefined inquiry is brought to a close.

As always, virtually every aspect of this process, from the gathering of evidence to the specific findings of review boards, is secret.  Consequently, we have no consistent information about the 50 priests who were returned to ministry, nor is there any consistent information about how the allegations against them were "resolved."

We do have documents related to one investigation in Boston, the case of Paul R. Edwards.  You can find out more about how this investigation was handled by reading the report of the Victims' Rights Committee, a group of truly independent experts on sexual assault.

p. 21 of pdf file

Note the appearance of new terminology: here the bishops seem to be counting the number of "credible allegations," rather than the actual number of allegations received.

Also, since only 71 percent of religious order and mixed religious institutes responded, these ill-defined figures may be severely understated.  Again, we have no way of verifying any of these numbers because the Church has refused to submit to independent audits of its response to crimes committed by priests and other Church employees.

p. 24 of pdf file

As one might expect in view of these questions, some dioceses cut off payment for therapy after six months, usually without warning and sometimes despite explicit assurances that payments would continue indefinitely.

Other dioceses offer only "spiritual counseling," an extremely low-cost alternative which is usually provided by religious personnel, without regard to the religious and spiritual beliefs of victims, many, if not most of whom rejected the moral authority of the Church after having been raped or otherwise assaulted by clergy.

Also note that the Church seems relatively unconcerned about the qualifications of the religious personnel who provide spiritual counseling, but suspicious of the therapists chosen by victims themselves. (**See more info below.)

p.25 of pdf file

Note the vague and passive language here.  In Boston, Church officials have repeatedly refused to conduct any outreach even in cases in which serial molesters with access to hundreds of children remained in service until well into the 1990's.

The Salesians of Don Bosco, one of the largest religious orders, has explicitly acknowledged that it does not conduct outreach in the aftermath of allegations because such efforts could open the door to additional lawsuits.

p. 26 of pdf file

 At least 144 confidentiality agreements were signed in at least 23 dioceses across the country in 2004.  We have no idea how many confidentiality agreements were signed by religious orders and mixed religious institutes.

Note that only "some dioceses" have limited the confidentiality to settlement amounts.  We have no idea how many of these agreements serve to conceal criminal activity, how many were designed to keep victims insulated from one another, or how many were crafted to hide collateral offenses such as violations of mandatory reporting laws.

The diocese of Manchester, which first acknowledged that it had reached 26 confidentiality agreements and then later reduced this number to 0, reportedly explained this discrepancy by saying that officials there did not regard the 26 agreements they had signed as relevant to the audit because they had promised not to go after victims who subsequently spoke out.

In other words, it seems that dioceses were free to define their answers to the auditors as they pleased rather than conforming to any uniform standard, a level of latitude that makes it impossible to trust any of the audit results.

p. 26 of pdf file

Again, this passage implies that the auditors kept track of the number of allegations received in each diocese during 2003, but were directed not to include this information in individual audit reports.  And if "directed" seems too strong a term, remember that the bishops, not the auditors, control every aspect of the audit process. 

As Kathleen McChesney acknowledged to advocates in Massachusetts late last year, the auditors have no power to compel the bishops to divulge any information, and the entire notion of compliance is problematic because the articles of the bishops' Charter are, in her words, "like Swiss cheese."

The report here suggests that the accused are "temporarily removed from ministry" after some Church entity ascertains the credibility of accusations through some unknown process.  In past documents, and elsewhere in this report, the Church has implied that "temporary removal" occurs at the onset of "preliminary investigations," and permanent removal occurs after Church officials conclude that allegations are credible. 

In all cases, the standards used to evaluate allegations and make these decisions remain a mystery so it's not surprising that the people who ought to be fully informed about this process are still bewildered.

Also note that bishops are missing from the list of the confused.