Denver, Colo., May 11, 2004 / 22:00 pm
The two main Colorado newspapers, The Denver Post and The Rocky Mountain News, revealed this Tuesday the sharp rebuke Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput wrote to the head of the National Review Board, who has accused bishops of dodging reforms adopted after the clergy sex scandal.
The Archbishop’s letter, which goes back to April 2, was made public by both newspapers after the independent weekly “National Catholic Reporter” revealed on Tuesday a heated, private exchange of letters between several Catholic bishops and Anne Burke, an Illinois Court of Appeals Justice and interim head of the National Review Board.
The NRB is a lay body set up by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) in 2002 to oversee sex abuse reforms.
The National Catholic Reporter quotes Burke’s letter to USCCB’s President Wilton Gregory in which she claims, “We find it more than disingenuous to have permitted our members to make their presentations to the Administrative Committee and never once bring up or mention the letters from some bishops asking to defer these matters until November.”