Bishops' lawyer says church must guard its autonomy

National Catholic Reporter, Jan 31, 2003 by Gill Donovan

The top lawyer for the U.S. Catholic church said bishops need to guard against lawmakers who want to use the recent sex abuse scandal to push laws that would damage the church. "There are forces at work in this society that will, unless checked, radically remake the religious institutions serving the public," Mark Chopko, general counsel for the U.S. bishops' conference, said Jan. 15 in a speech at Catholic University's Columbus School of Law.

Chopko criticized new laws in California and New York that force the church to pay for contraception for employees, and a proposed law in Kentucky that would remove the confidentiality of the confessional in abuse cases. "We can't sacrifice long-term principles for short-term punishment," he said, adding later that "certainly we cannot allow the state and the government to drive the church according to its agenda."

Chopko said exorbitant financial settlements have made church insurers reluctant to settle and instead favor lengthy court battles. He further predicted 1,000 new court cases involving sex abuse within the next two years. "Litigation, I fear, will waste resources on attacking and defending the church that should be and can be better spent resolving claims in fairness and justice," Chopko said.