Doing right thing

The Roman Catholic church is finally taking the initiative to redress its problem by looking the other way and transferring flagitious priests from one diocese to the next without first addressing their problems.

At the annual National Conference of Catholic Bishops members proposed standards that would make it more difficult for priests who have been kicked out of a seminary to seek employment within a different one.

The proposed standards include review of priests' records and accessing previous bishops and superiors for information.

This new investigative system will reduce the risk of having pedophiles within the church. It is astounding that it took the Roman Catholic Church so long to implement such a system into its hiring process.

According to a spokesman for the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, review of priests' records revealed problems that range from "fairly minor personality flaws to neuroses and psychoses that make [seminarians] a burden."

These are often not light issues, which can be seen by the recent uprise of civil lawsuits based on molestations brought against Roman Catholic parishes.

Now no matter what the circumstances are within a church, be it transfers or priest shortages, congregations can at least now be assured extra time was taken to hire a secure, worthy candidate for priesthood.