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Catholic
priest receives reassignment as a result of prevention policy DALLAS (AP) — The longtime pastor of a prominent Dallas Catholic parish is fighting his reassignment for not conducting background checks of church workers under the diocese’s strict sexual abuse prevention policy. In a letter faxed Sunday to Dallas Bishop Charles V. Grahmann, the Rev. Stephen W. Bierschenk of St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church said he has received the “overwhelming support of my parishioners” and that removing him “will unnecessarily damage the spiritual life of hundreds of people as well as my own.” He adds that he will “invoke all my rights under the Canon Law of the Catholic Church” in objecting to the transfer to the small St. Michael Church in McKinney, north of Dallas. Bierschenk’s supporters said they planned a candlelight vigil outside the church Monday evening as Grahmann confirmed St. Thomas Aquinas eighth-graders inside. Arch McColl, the priest’s civil attorney, said Monday that canon law protects priests from punitive reassignments without due process. “They’ve kept things secret from him. They’ve flashed 15 pages of documents at him and not provided him with copies,” said McColl, who also leads a loosely organized group of parish supporters. At Saturday afternoon and Sunday masses, Bierschenk told parishioners that the diocese was removing him for failing to conduct required background checks. In his message, which also was posted on the parish Web site, Bierschenk said he met April 9 with Grahmann and his coadjutor, Bishop Joseph Galante, and chancellor Mary Edlund. He said the trio told him the parish school “received very good marks” for compliance with the diocesan policy, but workers in the church office, a religious education program and the church’s youth ministry as well as parish volunteers had not been checked. |
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