Bishops of Canada to receive report by committee of inquiry

Tuesday, April 21 2009

(CCCB-Ottawa)… Having visited Mexico 15 to 18 April 2009, the committee of inquiry of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB) is now preparing to report to the CCCB Permanent Council. The Bishops of Canada will then be notified of the results of the inquiry, after which these will be made public. The committee was established to look into allegations about five Mexican organizations that had received project funding from the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace.

While in Mexico, the members of the committee met with representatives of the Episcopal Conference of Mexico and with senior representatives of the organizations mentioned in the allegations. Prior to the inquiry, information had circulated which suggested these groups had expressed support for abortion, although the organizations have denied this.

The committee of inquiry is chaired by Most Reverend Martin W. Currie, Archbishop of St. John’s, Newfoundland, and Most Reverend François Lapierre, P.M.É., Bishop of Saint-Hyacinthe, Quebec. Assisting them are Msgr. Mario Paquette, P.H., CCCB General Secretary, and Msgr. Carlos Quintana Puente, C.S.S., from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops where he is Executive Director of its Secretariat for the Church in Latin America.

The visit to Mexico provided an opportunity for the committee to investigate the specific issues raised by the Mexican allegations as well as letting it see first-hand how Development and Peace approaches its work with its partners in the Global South.

Development and Peace was founded by the Bishops of Canada in 1967 as their official agency for development work and emergency relief in the Global South. It is also the Canadian branch of Caritas Internationalis.