Thank you for your fulsome reply, Kieran. 

Do we have any statistics as to recidivism among defrocked priests? Without doubt in the past, retained priests have re-offended. But then again, in the past retention was often without anything remotely like proper restraint. 

I believe there have been a few places in the US (can't recall any specifics) where offending priests were housed together in a quasi-monastic setting, with severe restraints on their freedom of movement, including requiring specific permission for each and every excursion outside of the confines of their home. My image is of a life-long half-way-house for prisoners on parole. For confirmed pedophiles, I imagine such a permanent constraint, accepted in obedience, is virtually the only way to prevent recidivism. Am I wrong?

Would you still prefer dismissal over such restraint? And more importantly, do you think victims would regard such restraint as preferable to releasing a pedophile back into the general population?