A priest has told the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry that the reforms of the Second Vatican Council contributed to the Church’s “horrible mistakes” on abuse.
According to the Scottish Catholic Observer, Mgr Peter Smith, former chancellor of Glasgow archdiocese, said the Church accepted conventional wisdom of the 1970s that it was “better to repair the , to fix them or to redeem them”, than punish them. In that era priests accused of abuse could be sent for therapy rather than face criminal charges.
