Helmut Dieser (right), Bishop of Aachen, and Stephan Burger, Archbishop of Freiburg, in Dresden on Wednesday
Image: dpa
The German bishops want to set up an expert council on abuse, but they don’t know how. Politics should help them. But she refuses.
EIt would be a revolution in the Catholic Church in Germany, yes in dealing with sexual abuse in general: A council of experts, made up of experts from the judiciary, medicine or psychology and those affected, appraised according to uniform standards how sexual abuse is dealt with in the 27 German dioceses; The ten members are selected without any involvement of the bishops, ideally by a government agency. The dioceses must report regularly to the body. If they do not comply with the standards, they will receive a public reprimand from the expert council. And in the near future, the independent experts will also examine sports clubs, schools and other institutions.
This is the core of the new concept of the German Bishops’ Conference for the “restructuring of the topic of ‘sexual abuse and experiences of violence'”, which their new abuse commissioner, Bishop Helmut Ders from Aachen, and his deputy, Archbishop Stephan Burger from Freiburg, presented on Wednesday at the spring plenary assembly of the Bishops in Dresden presented. It was the first appearance of the two bishops in their new roles, who had been elected to succeed Trier Bishop Stephan Ackermann in the fall. The concept is not entirely new; its main features had already been presented in autumn, and the bishops in Dresden now took the decision to do so.