DETROIT — Bishop Leonard P. Blair of Toledo issued a detailed complaint last Friday about what he called “distortions and misrepresentation of the facts” involved in reports concerning the doctrinal assessment of the Leadership Conference of Religious Women by the Vatican’s Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith.

Having been a part of the assessment, Bishop Blair — a former Detroit auxiliary bishop — said he could “only marvel at what is now being said, both within and outside the Church” concerning both the process of the assessment and the steps being taken to remedy “significant and longstanding doctrinal problems connected with the activities and programs of the LCWR.”

“The biggest distortion of all is the claim that the CDF and the bishops are attacking or criticizing the life and work of our Catholic sisters in the United States,” the bishop said in a letter titled, “Reality Check: The LCWR, CDF, and the Doctrinal Assessment.”

As an example of such a distortion, he cited a recent report on the “CBS Evening News” about a Mercy sister who is also a medical doctor.

“Unless the sister in question is espousing and/or promoting positions contrary to Catholic teaching — and there was no reason given to think that she is — then the Holy See’s doctrinal concerns are not directed at her or at the thousands of religious sisters in our country like her to whom we all owe a debt of gratitude for all that they do in witness to the Gospel,” Bishop Blair said.

Even calling the process an investigation is misleading, he continued, because it was instead an assessment of publicly available information concerning statements of LCWR officials and speakers at its conferences.

What the assessment sought, Bishop Blair explained, was an explanation from the LCWR as to how some of certain positions and statements could square with Church teaching.

“The fundamental question posed to the LCWR leadership as part of the assessment was simply this: What are the Church’s pastors to make of the fact that the LCWR constantly provides a one-sided platform — without challenge or any opposing view — to speakers who take a negative and critical position vis-a-vis Church doctrine and discipline and the Church’s teaching office? “ Bishop Blair said.

On Monday, superiors of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith met with the president and executive director of the LCWR.

As to what went on, the Vatican communique said only, “The meeting provided the opportunity for the Congregation and the LCWR officers to discuss the issues and concerns raised by the doctrinal assessment in an atmosphere of openness and cordiality.”