Bishop Kavanagh’s historic handling of sexual abuse referred to Rome.

Cardinal John Dew has referred to the Vatican the handling of historic sexual offending within the Dunedin Diocese.

The period under review is when Bishop John Kavanagh was bishop.

Recently Pope Francis’ published new procedures for making bishops accountable for their actions and non-actions.

The new procedures give power to a Metropolitan Archbishop to refer to the Vatican possible mis-handling of bishops from suffragan dioceses.

Kavanagh the fourth Catholic bishop of Dunedin died in 1985.

In 2018 public controversy arose about Dunedin city’s only Catholic secondary school being named after him.

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News category: New Zealand, News Shorts.

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