Defrocking of ex Vatican envoy for sex abuse a first in history

For the first time in history, a Roman Catholic ambassador was defrocked for sexual abuse. The Vatican’s former envoy to the Dominican Republic was stripped of his priesthood after being convicted of sex abuse by a church tribunal. Polish archbishop Jozef Wesolowski was found guilty by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, following claims that he sexually abused a number of children in the slums of Santo Domingo. Once his canonical conviction is definitive, he will face the Vatican City’s criminal tribunal, which could sentence him to prison. The Church has faced a decade-long series of scandals over abuse by priests and lay officials. The United Nations condemned the Vatican in January for allowing systematic cover-ups by reassigning priests suspected of child abuse to other posts. Pope Francis has vowed to crack down on abuse in the Catholic Church.

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