Parish transfers of abusive Catholic priests

The Church was widely criticized when it was discovered that some bishops knew about some of the alleged crimes committed, but reassigned the accused instead of seeking to have them permanently removed from the priesthood.

[4][5] Cardinal George Pell sat on a committee that approved moving Australia's most notorious sexually abusive priest Gerald Ridsdale from parish to parish dozens of times, including Mildura, Swan Hill, Warrnambool, Apollo Bay, Ballarat and Mortlake,[6] "allowing the priest to abuse countless more children while keeping the scandal under wraps".

[9] The Tages-Anzeiger in 2010 described Seidnitzer's life as 'the classic biography of an abusive priest of his time': 'Despite his repeated relapses, the Church sought to cover up the assaults, gave him new opportunities, and simply moved him to other places.

[11] The Follow-up Commission on Sexual Abuse produced a report in 2011, that included a regulation that no convicted priest may be moved to another parish where he could once again come into contact with children, and the Catholic Church in Belgium agreed to stop this practice.

[21] After parents complained about Preynat's behaviour, he was moved to Neulise (Loire department) at the other end of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Lyon do to "penance" under the supervision of Father Jean Plaquet.

[21] In September 2011, Cardinal Philippe Barbarin moved Preynat to Le Coteau (Loire department), where he was appointed in a priestly function, with his "penance" apparently being over.

[22] A well-documented case involves Peter Kramer, ordained as priest in Viechtach in 1997, who abused two boys in 1999, and was convicted to three years probation in 2000, in which time he was barred from working with children and had to undergo therapy.

[27] In response to the Wastl report, ex-Pope Benedict (Ratzinger) denied having known about H.'s past abuse and said he was not present at the January 1980 diocesan meeting at which the decision was made to transfer H. from Essen to Munich.

[27] Tony Walsh was a Catholic priest who, according to chapter 19 of the Murphy Report (published in 2010), "was moved from one parish to the next 'to prevent a scandal' and kept on abusing children, even though his superiors knew about it.

In 2003 Calcagno finally wrote a letter to cardinal Joseph Ratzinger for advice, providing a full documentation of claims of sexual abuse by the priest since 1980.

Ratzinger (who became Pope Benedict XVI two years later) is not known to have replied, but the priest in question was later moved to Portio Magnone (12 km from Feglino) to another Boy Scout camp where he was once again reported for sexual molestation.

[29] On 14 September 2018, NRC Handelsblad compiled a list of Roman Catholic cardinals and bishops in the Netherlands who ineptly dealt with accusations of child sexual abuse, including parochial transfers of suspects.

He ignored a victim's letter against auxiliary bishop Jan Niënhaus in 2000, and in 2007 ordained a father known to have abused pupils in a Twello boys boarding school to acolyte (leading altar servers) in Oldenzaal.

[30] Philippe Bär, bishop of Rotterdam (1983–1993), transferred multiple priests accused or found guilty of abuse to other dioceses when he could no longer maintain their position in his own.

[30] Guillaume Lemmens, bishop of Roermond (1932–1957), maintained a priest in his diocese for 20 years, even though he knew the man was convicted in 1941 for abusing two boys and a girl in Sittard.

[30] Wilhelmus Mutsaerts, bishop of Den Bosch (1943–1960), in 1957 moved a Grave chaplain to a new parish in Tilburg, knowing he had abused an altar server 'very frequently', personally seeing to it that the matter received no publicity.

[30] In 2005, the Roman Catholic Church in the Netherlands introduced an obligatory screening of any priest's criminal record before any appointment can take place, and since 2014 clerics are required to provide evidence of good behaviour.

Although Pope Francis finally defrocked Srebrzyński in 2016 (28 years after the Mielewczyk case was reported), he was seen participating during the June 2017 Lady of Fátima procession in Mogilno in full liturgical garment.

: 58:23 [33] In December 2022, Poland-based Dutch investigative journalist Ekke Overbeek stated in an interview that his 3-year research in Polish archives had revealed evidence that Pope John Paul II during his time as archbishop Karol Wojtyła of Kraków (1962–1978) had known about sexual abuse of minors by priests in at least four cases, but had covered it up.

In the words of the Catholic News Agency: "The journalists said that Wojtyla 'made all the necessary decisions at that moment: the quick removal of the priest from the parish, the suspension until the matter was resolved, and the obligation to live in a monastery,' where civil authorities then arrested him."

Bishop Jean-Marie Lovey responded by admitting priests were moved to other parishes "as a preventive measure", but denying that attempts were made to cover up the sexual abuse.

[36] James Robinson worked in parishes in the English Midlands and when an accusation of child abuse happened in the 1980s, the Roman Catholic Church allowed him to escape to the United States though they knew about an "unwholesome relationship" the priest had with a boy.

[44] In response to these allegations, both ecclesiastical and civil authorities have implemented procedures to prevent sexual abuse of minors by clergy and to report and punish it if and when it occurs.

[45][46] In the Archdiocese of Boston, John Geoghan was shifted from one parish to another, although Cardinal Bernard Law (Archbishop of Boston 1984–2002) had been informed of his sexual misconduct on a number of occasions, such as in December 1984 when auxiliary Bishop John M. D’Arcy wrote to Cardinal Law complaining about Geoghan's reassignment to another Boston-area parish because of his "history of homosexual involvement with young boys.

In response to a 1987 letter from the mother of an altar boy inquiring as to whether Birmingham had a history of molesting children, Cardinal Law replied, reassuring her that there was "no factual basis" for her concern.

[48] In the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange, auxiliary bishop Michael Patrick Driscoll (1990–1999) accepted and transferred priests despite reports of sexual misconduct.

William J. Lynn, of the archdiocese of Philadelphia, became the first senior official convicted in the United States for covering up the sexual abuse of children by priests he oversaw.

[59] The report also stated that Wuerl had allowed Ernest Paone to be transferred to the Diocese of Reno in 1991, despite a history of accusations of child abuse dating back to the early 1960s.

[63] In the book version of his 2019 film The Two Popes, New Zealand journalist and filmmaker Anthony McCarten described the Vatican's policy during the tenures of Pope John Paul II (1978–2005) and Joseph Ratzinger as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (1981–2005) as follows: 'Rather than excommunicating and bringing to justice those accused after an open investigation, the Vatican refused to divulge information to aid criminal investigations, blocked several internal inquiries, and in countless cases moved priests accused of abuse to new parishes or quietly reinstated those who had been forced by bishops to stand down from their positions.

[65][66] Defenders of the Church's actions have suggested that in reassigning priests after treatment, bishops were acting on the best medical advice then available, a policy also followed by the US public school system when dealing with accused teachers.