UN Blasts Holy See over Sexual Abuse: Please Read this Response from Fr. Lombardi

The Director of the Press Office of the Holy See, Fr. Federico Lombardi, SJ, has issued a Note to Vatican Radio (of which he is Director-General) regarding the United Nations, the Holy See, and the Committee on the Rights of the Child, in the wake of the Committee’s Concluding Observations on the reviewed Reports of the Holy See (and five member states that are also parties to the convention).

Fr. Lombardi SJ writes, “It is impossible not to see that the final recommendations of the Committee appear to present – according to the judgment of those, who followed closely the process that preceded them – serious limits,” noting in particular the Observations’ conspicuous lack of understanding of the specific nature of the Holy See – a lack he describes as, “particularly grave.”

The most serious issue with the Observations is found in the Committee’s apparent overstepping of its own purview. “The observations of the Committee,” writes Fr. Lombardi, “seem to go beyond its competencies, and to interfere in the very doctrinal and moral positions of the Catholic Church,” specifically regarding abortion, contraception, family education and other related areas.

Please read the rest of this worthwhile statement here.

The abuse of minors (or anyone, really) by clergy and efforts to impede justice are gravely evil. Intolerable. These things should never have happened, and they must not ever happen.

But the U.N. has seized an opportunity to attack the Church not just for its handling of these things, but also on matters of Church doctrine and morality. In doing so, we are shown its real objectives relative to the Church.