The Vatican today published an online guide to rules for handling sex abuse charges against priests and defended the pope's handling of the media storm, saying he was a "great communicator in his own way".
Just over a year after Pope Benedict acknowledged the Holy See had been slow to embrace the internet, after mishandling the case of a Holocaust-denying bishop, the Vatican posted a guide to its rules on how to deal with abuse charges.
Although the rules are not new, their publication in a short, simple format reflects the Roman Catholic Church's determination to deflect criticism that its response to the sex abuse scandal has been bureaucratic, secretive and defensive.
The official Vatican website called it an "introductory guide which may be helpful to lay persons and non-canonists (referring to 'canon' or internal church law)" to rules for local churches on how to respond to sex abuse allegations.
It made clear that bishops must report crimes to the police, saying "civil law concerning reporting of crimes to the appropriate authorities should always be followed".
Bishops should investigate every allegation, and any accusation with "a semblance of the truth" referred to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
This enforcement body once run by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict, is under fire from people representing victims of abuse for having responded too late or too leniently.
The brief document said that "in very grave cases where a civil criminal trial has found the cleric guilty of sexual abuse", the pope himself can be asked to dismiss the priest.
One victims' association, US-based SNAP (Survivors' Network of those Abused by Priests), called for "deeds, not words" and said "church policies, whether online or not, are largely irrelevant" as bishops could easily ignore them.
Reuters