Development and Peace investigation results: ‘No evidence’
Development and Peace, the official international development organization of the Catholic Church in Canada, has been mired by accusations that some of its partner agencies have promoted abortion access using Canadian funds. On Thursday, the Permanent Council of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops received the results of an investigation of five such organizations in Mexico. Today on Zoom (in English and French), Archbishop James Weisgerber, president of the CCCB, revealed that the as-yet-unreleased report clears Development and Peace of the allegations.
Kris Dmytrenko: A report was recently released to the Permanent Council regarding allegations that Development & Peace provided money for abortion-related services. The question is, how do these allegations relate to other allegations in other countries? Does this report address those, as well?
Archbishop Weisgerber: Well, of course, the investigation was simply of those five Mexican groups that were alleged to have been involved in things that are contrary to the teaching of the Church. Now, the report was received, but we are a conference of bishops, so all the bishops have to be informed about the report before it is made public, but that will be done fairly soon. But I can assure you that in the report, the bishops found very clearly that there was no evidence that Development and Peace in any way funded abortion-related activities. And, in fact, that’s not the allegation. The allegation is that they funded partners who were involved. And that also, there is no evidence of that. Now they could have been involved with other groups who were doing things. That may be. But we have very clear guidelines within Catholic moral theology around how we do that. Because we’re faced with that everywhere. The leadership of the Catholic Church wants the Church involved with other people, even people who don’t agree with us, provided that the disagreement that they have with us not be supported in any way or be given umbrage by our presence there. So it’s always kind of a prudential thing. But there’s no evidence that any of that has gone on in Mexico.
Obviously, we can’t send bishops everywhere in the world. But these are all allegations coming through websites. And it’s kind of the same sort of allegations coming, more or less, from the same kind of people. So we simply have to take our own responsibilities and move forward. We have the wisdom, we have the vision as a Church, and we have the goodwill of Development and Peace to be able to more forward, to give everybody confidence that we are acting as an agency of the Catholic Church.
Dmytrenko: Now there has been some criticism of the president of Development and Peace, Michael Casey, having been part of that investigative team in Mexico. How would you respond to those criticisms?
Archbishop Weisgerber: Well, the bishops don’t know Mexico and they don’t know the network and they don’t know the work. So Michael Casey’s job was to bring them together, to get them to see everybody. The bishops created the agenda. The bishops spoke with these five groups at very, very great length. They spoke to the bishops’ commission and the bishops—only the bishops—wrote the report. So I don’t think there’s any difficulty with that. It would have taken a much, much longer time to kind of find your way in all of these sorts of things.
Dmytrenko: How confident are you that Canadians are going to have restored trust in the mission of Development and Peace?
Archbishop Weisgerber: There’s a big issue there. It seems that there is a tendency on the part of some people to trust allegations on websites more than they trust the bishops. That’s the role of the bishops in the Church and when the bishops investigate something, when the bishops look at things and when the bishops teach, according to our theology, we should have confidence in that. That’s up to individual people to determine who really has the authority in the Church to decide what is Catholic.
Isn’t the allegation actually that Development and Peace funded organizations that promote abortion (in Mexico, South America, Africa, and elsewhere) and lobby for greater access to abortion? To me this would fall under the term “abortion related activities”.
It would have also been nice if he addressed the Peruvian bishops’ letter asking Canadian bishops to stop supporting organizations in Peru working against the Church and her moral and social teaching.
I think we have to be a little dissatisfied with the advice to “trust bishops more than websites” (paraphrase). I say this because other Canadian bishops (like Archbishop Collins) have voiced concerns as a result of photographic, audio, and print evidence put forth by the organizations themselves, published and easily found on the web.
Here’s an interesting quote from D & P’s website about where they give money. Notice that they state that they don’t directly give money to support condoms but they will still send money to a group that has elements of Catholic teaching. This does prove that they give money to organizations that support condom distribution, a clear violation of our Catholic teaching. It is from June 2003.
Truth goes hand in hand with openness, respect and tolerance of differences. These are values that are fundamental to any honest dialogue. Development and Peace respects and follows the teaching of the Catholic Church. In its relationships with other organisations, with other cultures and faith traditions, it does not silence its own faith and position. CCODP does not fund programs specifically designed to distribute condoms, nor does it fund elements of broader programs which involve condom distribution. In these latter cases CCODP will, however, continue to support the remaining components of broad programs, providing that they are consistent with CCODP’s approach to development work.
Why did the CCCB not ask the Conference of Catholic bishops of Mexico to investigate these groups and report their findings to their Canadian colleagues? Why were they kept out of the process? They would certainly have been more attuned to the Mexican situation than a group of outsiders. Given the fact that LifeSiteNews have provided documented evidence of these groups’ involvement in the promotion of abortion, the CCCB have no choice but to addresss every piece of “evidence” and prove them wrong, otherwise the CREDIBILITY of the bishops’ organization, not just its president, will be greatly diminished in the eyes of the Catholic laity of this country.
We remind those who wish to comment on this blog — and any of our entries — to please keep comments civil. Thank you.
We direct our readers to two articles in which the Archbishop Weisgerber commented more fully: http://www.zenit.org/article-26253?l=english and http://www.catholicregister.org/content/view/3227/849/
In these, the Archbishop addresses the question of D&P funding of partner groups that lobby for abortion legalization, saying that tighter protocols will be in effect and that the signing of a particular UN declaration was inappropriate. He also says that the CCCB is in the process of addressing the complaint from the Peruvian bishops’ conference.
It must be reiterated that that the Archbishop has revealed only some of the CCCB report, as he is entitled to do as the CCCB President. It would be premature to speculate on how the report will address allegations pertaining to D&P partners in other countries. It is also too soon to comment on the degree to which the CCCB will alter D&P protocols.
And, most certainly, it is uncharitable to question the integrity and credibility of the bishops before their report is released or even approved by the assembly. (The report is in their hands to consider and discuss until the CCCB plenary meeting in October, at which point it will be voted upon.) While we welcome discussion on the S+L blog, we have editorial license to not approve comments that unfairly–and, sometimes, libellously–malign our Catholic leadership.
With respect, Kris, I have read the report. It does not address the evidence. It simply denies an allegation that nobody made (i.e. that D&P directly supports abortion activities). But it fails to address the real problem.
Comments this week by Archbishop Collins of Toronto confirm what pro-life groups have been saying all along:
1. D&P needs a profound reform
2. D&P should not be partnering with groups that oppose Church teaching
3. D&P should work in partnership with local bishops.
I didn’t make that up. It comes from the Archbishop of Toronto. Read here: http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009_docs/dpstatementjuly2309.pdf
I find it disingenuous of you to stifle legitimate discussion on this topic by invoking a misplaced deference to episcopal authority (notice how all comments stopped after you brought down the hammer?). Yes, we must respect our bishops, but never at the expense of the Truth of the Gospel.
This is not libel towards our bishops. True charity involves fraternal correction and avoidance of scandal. Turning a blind eye to sin is not true Christianity.
Hi Steven,
If I may address this personally:
You seem to be suggesting that some of the bishops are in opposition to the truth of the Gospel. This does not correspond to my understanding of the seriousness with which they are continuing to examine the issue. If anything, the statements by Archbishop Collins and Archbishop Miller further confirm that the report was not intended to end discussion on Development and Peace. It was always understood that this would be a subject for discussion at the October plenary meeting of all the Canadian bishops. Likewise, we will continue to be covering the individual and collective responses of the bishops, which may include a more comprehensive look at the topic in a more appropriate medium than Zoom or the blog.
While we do allow some comments, the S+L blog was never intended as a forum for debate, much less for casting aspersions on anyone’s character or intentions. I regret that you feel singled out.
Thank you Steven G. You’ve hit the nail on the head.