The full cost of the Catholic Church’s sins in eastern Newfoundland will be revealed within days

The bill has been decades in the making, but it will take the Archdiocese of St. John’s just days to learn the full cost of decades of abuse by priests and Christian brothers, with the church itself implicated.

The Supreme Court of Newfoundland and Labrador heard Friday morning that lawyers had reached an agreement and the claim determinations will be handed over to the external insolvency monitor on Saturday.

What does that mean?

The 367 people who have come forward with allegations of abuse will soon find out how much they will receive.

“It was a huge problem in the community, and this is the reckoning,” said Geoff Budden, an attorney who represented more than 200 of those men and women.

Budden says he believes money will flow to survivors by the end of the summer. It’s not the first time he’s made a prediction about when payments might begin, but with the agreement announced Friday, he’s more confident than ever.

“We needed certainty. Our customers needed certainty, and now that we’re coming out, we have certainty.”

It is unlikely that the church will be able to pay all claims in advance. The church’s bill was estimated at $50 million, while there were approximately 100 claimants. As the deadline for submitting proposals approached, more and more claims poured in. Budden said they were still hearing from abuse survivors up until the last hour.

The church has raised more than $40 million so far by selling its assets on the Avalon Peninsula, including a $13 million deal for the county to buy former Catholic school properties.

There are also insurance policies that could reimburse a significant portion of the money. According to Budden, the provincial government may have to contribute more to claimants who were under state supervision or in cases where the abuse was related to the provincial education system.

Not just Mount Cashel survivors

The case was prompted by a court of appeal ruling on abuse by the Christian Brothers in Mount Cashel, but the case expanded to include people abused by priests who had not yet filed a complaint against the church.

All of these claims were then assessed by an independent third party, who had the unenviable task of assigning a monetary award to the pain and suffering of the survivors.

The abuse dates back to the 1940s and the first claims were filed in 1999. The archdiocese was found liable for the abuse at Mount Cashel in 2021 and filed for bankruptcy later that year.

In 2023, a related legal case, in which families of those who died en route demanded that they still be compensated for the pain and suffering, was separated from the main case.

At that point, five of the plaintiffs were dead. Four more have since died. The families are still waiting for the provincial appeals court to resolve their fight for full compensation.

While the archdiocese has yet to pay the full amount owed to survivors, the attorney said it will close several other properties soon and more are in the works.

“I’m optimistic that everyone will get 100 cents on the dollar,” Budden said.

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