Who should have jurisdiction over Catholic missionaries, the pope or the police?

[Traitorfish]

The Vatican is a nation though as well as a religious organization.

Only in common parlance; legally, as I have said, the Holy See and the Vatican City are distinct entities, one a religious organisation, the latter a sovereign state. That the two, in practice, hugely overlap does not imply that the latter may lend it's sovereignty to the former, any more than Elizabeth II may lend the sovereignty of the United Kingdom to the Anglican Church of Canada.

 

[RoboPig]

The Vatican is a nation though as well as a religious organization.

But the Vatican and the Catholic Church are not the same thing, even though the Vatican is controlled by the Church hierarchy. So the Pope does have immunity when he goes abroad, since he is the head of a state, but your local Parish church is not the same thing as a "Vatican consulate".

 

[Mathilda]

There's no reason it shouldn't be the same relationship as between an employee, employer and law enforcement anywhere.

 

[Bill3000]

For, according to the Blessed Dionysius, it is a law of the divinity that the lowest things reach the highest place by intermediaries. Then, according to the order of the universe, all things are not led back to order equally and immediately, but the lowest by the intermediary, and the inferior by the superior.

Hence we must recognize the more clearly that spiritual power surpasses in dignity and in nobility any temporal power whatever, as spiritual things surpass the temporal. This we see very clearly also by the payment, benediction, and consecration of the tithes, but the acceptance of power itself and by the government even of things. For with truth as our witness, it belongs to spiritual power to establish the terrestrial power and to pass judgement if it has not been good.

Thus is accomplished the prophecy of Jeremias concerning the Church and the ecclesiastical power: 'Behold to-day I have placed you over nations, and over kingdoms' and the rest. Therefore, if the terrestrial power err, it will be judged by the spiritual power; but if a minor spiritual power err, it will be judged by a superior spiritual power; but if the highest power of all err, it can be judged only by God, and not by man, according to the testimony of the Apostle: 'The spiritual man judgeth of all things and he himself is judged by no man'.

This authority, however, (though it has been given to man and is exercised by man), is not human but rather divine, granted to Peter by a divine word and reaffirmed to him and his successors by the One Whom Peter confessed, the Lord saying to Peter himself, 'Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound also in Heaven' etc.

Therefore whoever resists this power thus ordained by God, resists the ordinance of God, unless he invent like Manicheus two beginnings, which is false and judged by us heretical, since according to the testimony of Moses, it is not in the beginnings but in the beginning that God created heaven and earth.

Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

 

[civ_king]

Yeah, I don't think anyone is arguing that there shouldn't be an investigation, but I have to question the necessity of breaking upon tombs, detaining people for nine hours without food and water and confiscating testimonies given by sex abuse victims to the Church in confidence.
Btw, when did the Belgian bishops become "missionaries"?

 

[warpus]

Do you believe the police have the right to take actions that are technically on foreign soil (Catholic churches are owned by the Holy See, which is the government of the Vatican City, a sovereign state).

Bullcrap.

The Catholic church has a long history of covering up and helping child molesters, moving them around to different parts of the world once they've been discovered, etc.

Let the police do their work.

 

[Samson]

Yeah, I don't think anyone is arguing that there shouldn't be an investigation, but I have to question the necessity of breaking upon tombs, detaining people for nine hours without food and water and confiscating testimonies given by sex abuse victims to the Church in confidence.

I would not seriously question the nessesaty of these actions. If any organisation was known to be in posesion of evidence in a serious investigation I would expect the police to take action to aquire that evidence, even if the organisation did not have a long history of withholding such evidence.

If you withhold evidence from the police in a sexual abuse investigation and the worst that happens is not getting a glass of water for 9 hours I expect you are pretty lucky.

Drilling small holes in obvious hiding places seems a pretty minimal search strategy to me.

 

[JollyRoger]

Why were the police handling this? Belgium should have declared war on the Vatican and stormed the place with the military.

 

[civ_king]

I would not seriously question the nessesaty of these actions. If any organisation was known to be in posesion of evidence in a serious investigation I would expect the police to take action to aquire that evidence, even if the organisation did not have a long history of withholding such evidence.

If you withhold evidence from the police in a sexual abuse investigation and the worst that happens is not getting a glass of water for 9 hours I expect you are pretty lucky.

Drilling small holes in obvious hiding places seems a pretty minimal search strategy to me.

The Vatican put together a commission in 2000 to investigate the reported child molestation, this board has since shut down because police took ALL of the documents

 

[Samson]

The Vatican put together a commission in 2000 to investigate the reported child molestation, this board has since shut down because police took ALL of the documents

Sounds reasnoble, assuming the Vatican had not supplied police with copies of these documents. Can you imagine any other organisation being allowed to keep infrmation from the police in such a serious criminal investigation?

 

[Akka]

I don't know all the facts, so I won't comment on this specific case.
But as a general rule, the law of the country trumps the law of the Church.

 

[civ_king]

Sounds reasnoble, assuming the Vatican had not supplied police with copies of these documents. Can you imagine any other organisation being allowed to keep infrmation from the police in such a serious criminal investigation?

What if the victims didn't want to go to the police and chose to gave it to the Church?

 

[JollyRoger]

What if the victims didn't want to go to the police and chose to gave it to the Church?

Crime is crime. Victims can be influentional on whether to prosecute, but they don't and shouldn't have the final say.

 

[GoodGame]

What are your thoughts on this?

Do you believe the police have the right to take actions that are technically on foreign soil (Catholic churches are owned by the Holy See, which is the government of the Vatican City, a sovereign state).

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100628/ap_on_re_eu/eu_vatican_belgium

If there's reasonable suspicion?

 

[civ_king]

What are your thoughts on this?

Do you believe the police have the right to take actions that are technically on foreign soil (Catholic churches are owned by the Holy See, which is the government of the Vatican City, a sovereign state).

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100628/ap_on_re_eu/eu_vatican_belgium

The OP is factually flawed because basically every country has it's own Catholic Church and they are all in communion with the Holy See, therefore they aren't foreign soil