The subject was not on the program. But after the mid-October revelations about the former bishop of Créteil Michel Santierone year later the explosive Saved report, the episcopate had to revise its plans. Gathered in plenary assembly until Tuesday in Lourdes, the 120 members of the Conference of Bishops of France will work on “concrete proposals” in order to improve transparency in the measures taken against clerics.
Retired in 2021, Michel Santier had been sanctioned in November of the same year by the Vatican authorities for “spiritual abuse having led to voyeurism on two adult men”, committed in the 1990s within the framework of the confession , when he was a priest in Coutances and director of a prayer training school for young people.
A Canonical National Criminal Court in the pipeline
A year after the publication of the report by the Sauvé Commission on the extent of pedocrime in the institution, these revelations created anger among the victims and among the faithful, who denounced the “silence” of the bishops around this sanction. Eric de Moulins-Beaufort, president of the CEF, admitted “hearing the request for greater clarity on canonical procedures and the measures that may result from them”. And promised to reflect, from the Lourdes session, “on changes in our procedures, in our way of conducting them as well as of communicating the results”.
Concretely, “a first time of exchanges” is planned for Thursday, the opening day, specifies Hugues de Woillemont, secretary general of the CEF. On Friday, “an expert in canon law and a criminal lawyer” will intervene to provide their insights. On Saturday, “work will be carried out to develop concrete proposals”, which will be “submitted to the vote” at the end of the assembly, he detailed. The bishops must also vote on the definitive statutes of a canonical National Criminal Court, an unprecedented structure in France which must open at the beginning of 2023. “The expectation of victims is great, as well as among the faithful and among priests”, continues Hugues de Woillemont. The challenge is to “restore confidence” and to “continue the work launched a year ago” after the Sauvé report.
The collective of faithful Agir pour notre Eglise, which organized rallies of angry Catholics last weekend in different cities in France, made several proposals. For example: that “any opening of an investigation or former conviction be announced to the parish council”. For its part, the group of victims Parler et revivre detailed several requests, in a letter to the bishops on Wednesday. He thus suggests “that each of these cases give rise to a systematic call for witnesses (…) to seek out other possible victims”. And warns that he will be “attentive (…) to the acts” exercised “through all the dioceses”.