The Dicastery for Bishops reprimanded several Swiss bishops for “not correctly” addressing accusations of clerical sexual abuse, but it did not find any evidence that would require a canonical trial.
A statement by the Swiss bishops’ conference did not specify how many or which bishops received individual rebukes from the dicastery but said “three more letters will follow”. The Swiss Catholic news portal kath.ch named six.
The reprimand followed a confidential report made last year by a priest in Bern accusing six bishops – four of them still in office – of covering up abuse allegations. The priest has since received anonymous death threats.
Five months later, an initial report commissioned by the Swiss bishops identified 1,002 cases of abuse and 510 perpetrators since the 1950s and said these figures were only the “tip of the iceberg”.
“These reprimands are more than a warning finger that can be safely ignored,” wrote Christian Maurer, editor-in-chief of kath.ch, but he said those who had received them were “slippery nit-pickers [who] act as if everything went well”.
The outlet named Bishop Jean-Marie Lovey of Sion, Bishop Charles Morerod of Lausanne, Geneva and Fribourg, Abbot Jean Scarcella of Saint Maurice, Bishop Alain de Raemy, the apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Ticino, the former Bishop of Reykjavik Pierre Bürcher and the former nuncio Archbishop Jean-Claude Périsset.
Lovey, Morerod and Scarcella gave only vague answers to local requests for comment on the conference statement, or decline to speak.
The statement summarised but did not directly quote a letter from Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, the prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops.
It said he had told them they had improved their management of abuse cases but could still respond better. It emphasised that clerical abuse must be reported according to approved procedures.
The Swiss bishops “deeply regrets the errors, shortcomings and omissions in the application of the canonical norms”, the statement added.
“They are in a learning process and would like to express their will once again to take more decisive action against abuse in the Church.”
A German Swiss victims defence group, known by its acronym IG MikU, said it was “unbelievable” that the bishops “only got a reprimand from Rome”.
“In companies, the manager would not only be reprimanded. He would have to resign!”
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