Church abuse liability

A Roman Catholic archdiocese in the US is to declare bankruptcy because it cannot meet the cost of claims by people allegedly abused by its priests.....

news.bbc.co.uk...


I saw this on BBC World news and wondered how this could be.
What is the financial liability of the Vatican in all of this? Are the Catholic churches in the US, in some way connected to Rome? Or are maybe they are not?
If they are, then how are they able to file for bankruptcy? I thought that the Vatican had a vast amount of money. Somehow, the Vatican is not mentioned as being liable for this type of crime. Why not?

What on earth are the churchs of the world doing with not helping the victims of this sick and twisted abuse. Its right across all denominations but the actions on the diffrent organisations is chilling the same deny,blame the victim and then when caught fight to the death before paying up.

Quote: "The Vatican is a nation with diplomatic immunity that shields it from suits, he noted. Also, it does not have complete oversight over any diocese in the United States.
As a result, the Holy See cannot be sued for liability in a molestation case involving an American Catholic priest, Drinan said."

www.miami.com...

If this is the case, then surely this should also be handled via political means. I havn't seen any presidents or prime ministers come forward to condem or apply pressure to the nation that is the Vatican.

I havn't seen any presidents or prime ministers come forward to condem or apply pressure to the nation that is the Vatican.

Because to do so would be political suicide. What politician wants to be remembered as the man who tried to tell the church what to do.