BISHOPS IN BALANCING ACT (Perv-boot rule won’t push zero tolerance)

U.S. Catholic bishops approved a national policy to bar child-molesting priests from working as clergy, but not to expel them from the priesthood - falling short of a proposal to defrock such priests.  From this day forward, no one who is known to have abused a child will work in a Catholic church in the United States, said Bishop Wilton Gregory, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.  He said, We bishops apologize to anyone harmed by one of our priests and for our tragically slow response in recognizing the horror of sexual abuse.