A history of well-publicized events of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church has led to much soul-searching, resulting in risk-management guidelines and procedures that have lowered injuries and claims of children and youth, according to a priest and risk manager for the church.
“The church, like any other institution, has risks it has to manage,” says Monsignor Edward J. Arsenault, a Roman Catholic priest for 23 years. He also is president and CEO of Saint Luke Institute in Silver Spring, Md., which offers education and treatment for Catholic priests and religious men and women. He is a priest of the Diocese of Manchester, N.H.
“As much as we try to prevent things from happening in the first place, when they do happen we work with insurers and self-insurance,” he says, observing that the church “generally is not oriented to risk management in a traditional business sense. Our natural pastoral inclination is if somebody is harmed, you ask, 'What can I do to help you?'”
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