Bishop banned

VATICAN CITY (AP)

The Vatican has ordered a Belgian bishop who resigned last year after admitting he had sexually abused his nephew to no longer act as a priest in public and warned that he may risk further church sanctions.

The Vatican yesterday clarified the punishment against former Bruges Bishop Roger Vangheluwe after Belgian bishops reported over the weekend that he had merely been sent outside Belgium for spiritual and psychological counselling, a seemingly cushy punishment given the seriousness of the crime.

The decision was the first known application of the Vatican's new sex-abuse norms approved last year, giving the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith jurisdiction to investigate and punish bishops, not just priests, who abuse minors. The ultimate possible penalty: defrocking, or laicization in church-speak.