An "unscheduled" safeguarding audit and review has been launched in the Catholic church following claims of lockdown gatherings in Newcastle.
The Catholic Safeguarding Standards Agency will carry out the review into the Diocese of Hexham and Newcastle.
The BBC understands it involves claims from a whistleblower that men were regularly drinking on the St Mary's Cathedral complex during lockdown 2021.
The inquiry is also expected to examine the suicide of Canon Michael McCoy.
Fr McCoy, Dean of St Mary's Cathedral, killed himself in April 2021, days after police began an inquiry into a historical child sex abuse allegation made against him.
The diocese said it remains "fully committed" to safeguarding.
The Catholic Safeguarding Standards Agency (CSSA) was set up to advise on and audit the work of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, and is able to sanction clergy who do not meet standards.
The review, first reported by the Sunday Times, is backed by the Archbishop of Liverpool, the Most Reverend Malcolm McMahon, who oversees the Hexham and Newcastle diocese.
The diocese said it had previously invited the CSSA to conduct a review following the resignation of the former Bishop of Hexham and Newcastle, the Right Reverend Robert Byrne, in December 2022.
He quit the role after three years saying it had become "too great a burden", and had resigned "with great sorrow" and a "heavy heart".
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