Vatican Responds To Abuse Charges

The Vatican appointed a deputy Thursday to Cardinal Hans Hermann Groer, a move apparently aimed at easing him into retirement following allegations he sexually abused minors.

The government of the heavily Roman Catholic country was quick to approve Pope John Paul II’s action. “A period of uncertainty and speculation has come to an end,” said Chancellor Franz Vranitzky, who had urged the church last week to settle the controversy.

The pope named Christoph Schoenborn, 50, as archbishopcoadjutor with a right of succession to Groer, who serves as archbishop of Vienna.

Last month a weekly newsmagazine published charges from a former seminary student that Groer, as a religious instructor in the early 1970s, had abused him repeatedly.