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While a future pope could change any decree Francis issues, canonists, cardinals and even rank-and-file Catholics have argued new norms are needed because Benedict’s decisions in retirement impacted his successor from the very start.

The changes to the Code of Canon Law took 11 years to develop and included input from canonist and criminal law experts.

Astigueta, a Jesuit canonist at the Gregorian, has said such institutional secrecy surrounding abuse case harms the development and practice of the church’s own law.

While church trials do make use of police investigations and evidence from secular courts, a counter-study commissioned by an entire bishops’ conference could run into jurisdictional problems at a canonical trial, canonists said.

The canonist John of Ayton, reciting the decrees of Ottobon and of Boniface, with their injunction that bishops shall “cause them to be observed,” exclaims Cause to be observed!