The Mananthawady diocese of Kerala’s Syro-Malabar Roman Catholic Church reeling under a devastating sexual abuse scandal involving a senior priest is considering stringent measures including putting the presbyteries at its parishes under CCTV surveillance to curb incidents of clerical sexual abuse.
The diocese has come up with the plan in the context of the arrest of Fr Robin Vadakkumchery, Vicar of St Sebastian’s Church in Kottiyoor in Kannur district, who allegedly raped a 16-year-old girl at the parsonage of his church. The victim had given birth to a baby boy on February 7.
The precautionary measures the diocese is now planning to implement had come up in the form of suggestions at a meeting of the priests under it and pastoral council last week, said sources. Robin, 48, was arrested on February 27 from Chalakudy in Thrissur district when he was allegedly preparing to flee to Canada through the Kochi International Airport.
The plan of the Mananthawady diocese under which the Kottiyoor parish comes is to put the office spaces attached to parsonages under CCTV surveillance. It hopes that this would be useful in identifying the visitors to parsonages, making the functioning of presbyteries more transparent and for avoiding allegations.
Besides installing CCTV cameras at presbyteries, priests would be asked to conduct counseling sessions only in open spaces. Robin had allegedly raped the girl, a Plus 1 student of a Church-run school of which he was manager, several times in his parsonage in May last when she was doing the work of a data-entry operator at the church.
Immediately after the Kottiyoor sex abuse scandal erupted, the diocese had removed Robin from all priestly duties and responsibilities. The scandal has had a devastating effect as far as the church is concerned as two senior priests and six nuns are among the ten accused in the case and several Church-run institutions have allegedly been involved in it.
Apart from that, stringent controls would be enforced on the entry of women into parsonages. Only vicars and assistant vicars would be allowed to spend nights at the parsonages. One of the proposals is that there is no need for engaging altar girls and even if they are engaged, proper and separate facilities should be arranged for their convenience.
The diocese is also planning to form parish-level grievance cells comprising priests, nuns and religious and lay people in order to consider complaints and settle them at local level. It has also been decided that no new construction work would be undertaken in the diocese for the next five years though the works currently under way would be allowed to be completed.
The proposed guidelines also include the condition that the priests should not use their speeches from the pulpit to defame any member of the laity for not making financial contributions to the Church. Also, rites like marriage, baptism and funeral services should not be denied to believers over arrears of contributions.
The diocese is also planning to strictly ban parishes and priests from arranging foreign trips for individuals and groups. Robin, a highly influential priest inside the Church and outside and is said to have made foreign tours many times, is facing the allegation of sending several young women for work in Canada.
Representatives of the laity had argued at the meeting that the diocesan authorities were responsible for the sexual abuse scandal and that it had remained silent whenever complaints had come up against Robin in the past, sources said. They also wanted the top clergy to take a serious note of the tendency among priests and other religious persons to adopt luxurious lifestyle.