Finishing touches put to Toronto abuse protocols

TORONTO - Toronto’s new rules for what to do when a priest or Church employee is accused of sexual misconduct will be revealed in early October.

Over the summer a panel of experts, working with the archdiocese’s judicial vicar Fr. Brian Clough, reviewed and revised Toronto’s Church law governing sex abuse cases, bringing it in line with the latest directives from the Vatican.

The new norms will be Toronto’s fourth version of the sex abuse policies since the first Toronto law was promulgated in 1992.

In the first two weeks of September the archdiocese held meetings explaining the new norms to four regional groupings of priests. Further meetings with archdiocese employees are scheduled for the last week in September, clearing the way for public promulgation of the new rules the first week of October, said Neil MacCarthy, the archdiocese’s director of public relations and communications.