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Last month, we looked at the devastating 60 Minutes report on the lack of transparency in the Buffalo diocese. The diocese publicly had named 42 priests with accusations of sex abuse of minors, but a whistleblower, the bishop's former executive assistant, told 60 Minutes about coming across some files stored in a cleaning closet that listed accusations against over 100 priests. In addition, a priest of the diocese who advised the bishop on canon law matters told 60 Minutes that there were priests with accusations against them who still were in active ministry. The bishop, Richard Malone, is under intense scrutiny and pressure from media and local Catholics, and the diocese is being investigated by state and federal officials.
Crux is now reporting that the diocese has released the names of an additional 36 priests with accusations against them, and has received a "tsunami" of additional allegations.
From the Crux story:
Embattled Bishop Richard Malone added 36 names Monday to a public list of priests with substantiated claims of sexual abuse of a child, bringing the number to 78 [...] The revised priest list released Monday includes priests from other religious orders, which had previously been excluded. Diocesan officials said they would not name an additional 66 dead priests who were the subject of a single complaint.If I am doing the math right, 78+66=144 priests, which is close to, or exactly, the same number reported in the 60 Minutes story. The way the numbers break down tells an interesting story in its own right:
- The initial 42 priests who had been publicly identified apparently are diocesan priests
- The additional 36 priests whose names now have been released seem to be religious-order priests. Religious orders are, in many respects, independent of specific dioceses; they have their own missions, charisms, leadership structures, funding, property, rules, customs, assignments and so on. Nevertheless, a religious order can't operate a parish or a school in a diocese without the permission and oversight of the local bishop; as we say rather awkwardly in the business world, the religious order priests "dotted line" to the bishop when the order runs a parish or school. Legally and morally, is the diocese responsible for the misdeeds of members of religious orders within the diocese? I guess that depends on your view of the strength of the dotted line. Malone, it seems, had been looking to answer "No" to that question, at least until this week when he released the names of the religious order priests with accusations. I find it hard to believe that a secular court would give the diocese a pass on abuse at any parish or school in the diocese, whether it is run by the diocese or a religious order
- That Malone refuses to release the names of 66 deceased priests also is interesting. That approach seems directly contrary to the spirit of transparency. I would guess that, in some respects, releasing the names of deceased priests is the least troublesome for a diocese. A dead priest can't be subpoenaed or depositioned. He can't cut deals with prosecutors to implicate higher-ups in the diocese. And of course, he can't continue to abuse.
The establishment of the Independent Reconciliation and Compensation Program in March, [Malone] said, added to a flood of new complaints. “We asked the victims to come forward. They have, and the numbers were overwhelming,” Malone said. “I think the image, the word tsunami is not inappropriate.” The diocese received 191 new complaints in the past year, compared with seven complaints the previous year and four the year before, Lawlor Quinlan, an attorney for the diocese, said. Virtually all of them involve allegations from the 1950s through the 1980s, and none allege abuse from 2000 on, he said. No priest ordained in the past 20 years has been accused, Quinlan said.According to this news report, the program consists of a pot of money provided by the diocese to compensate victims, and a window of 60 days for victims to file reports.
Malone is certainly a stubborn fighter but the odds are very much against him. Rocco in his latest post points out an important fact:
ReplyDeletehttp://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/2018/11/on-election-day-popes-us-midterms.html
Lest anyone hasn't already noticed, after moving at a striking clip for the last two years, American Catholicism's second round of an all-out abuse storm has seen the nation's appointment docket essentially grind to a halt.
Since the end of the Vatican's summer recess, just one pick has come from the Pope
Back to the wider board, there are several reasons for the slow-down, but well among them, the DC Nunciature's usual bandwidth has ostensibly been sucked up with handling the various and widespread aspects of the crisis' fallout (not all of which have likely emerged as yet). Yet when it comes to the docket itself, another extraordinary thing has quietly taken hold: as of this writing, no less than five vacant Stateside dioceses are either currently or just have been under investigation, civil or canonical alike.
All but one are focused on the scandals – and one happens to be the nation's capital, to boot.
As if that wasn't enough, the list is set to grow: given the ongoing "tsunami" in Buffalo over Bishop Richard Malone'
it seems increasingly palpable that the 72 year-old Harvard man (a onetime auxiliary to Cardinal Bernard Law) won't be able to survive a sea of hurdles that merely includes the lone active Federal probe of a diocese beyond the Department of Justice's recently-charted investigation of the Pennsylvania church.
In appointing bishops, Rome is in a kind of Catch-22. They need a very experienced bishop to manage the fall out in many of these dioceses, but they have to worry that experience may also mean that the bishop has not been transparent in his former diocese.
ReplyDeleteAs Rocco hints, the remaking of the American bishops is likely to increasing occupy Rome's time. Francis has made it very clear from day one that he hates the culture wars which divide the American bishops, and wants them out of politics. That is why he wants them to spend time praying, and discerning (i.e. undergo a conversion).
Remember that the bishops all go to Rome at the end of 2019 for their ad limina visits. I expect they are going to get a rough reception if they have not gotten their act together.
Too many American bishops are hoping that Francis will go away. Increasing however he is getting to the thresholds in appointments especially in cardinals, that make a non-European successor likely.
And a tough reception from Francis will do exactly what??
DeleteThe strong cadre of US bishops who will resist him at every turn (Vasa, Cordileone, ad nauseum) will simply continue to lay low and wait for Francis' demise. Then the Raymond Burke cohort will take their chasubles and trains out of mothballs and welcome the inevitable swing backwards with the next papacy.
Remember the 11th commandment: Thou shalt NOT fund fiends and fools! If you do, kwitcherbitchin.
I think someone else has pointed out that the Vatican has the same problem Germany did after World War II -- the people who knew how to do the job were all tainted, and the people who were not tainted didn't know how to do the job.
ReplyDeleteIt's a tough one. I imagine there will be not a few touchy exchanges among the shepherds when they gather next week to figure out how to calm the flock.
Another one bites the dust here. This time it is a gray area. The misdeeds weren't to the level of being a crime. The person went to rehab in '14, and reportedly has been on the straight and narrow since. Parishioners have written the archbishop asking him to reconsider accepting the priest's resignation.
ReplyDeleteBut, “It is unlikely Archbishop Lucas would reconsider his decision to accept (Syring’s) resignation now that he has made the decision to hold priests to a higher standard of conduct,” chancelor of the archdiocese, Deacon Tim McNeil wrote.
The priests who have to take up the slack when one of them in active ministry resigns are stressed. Parishioners are stressed.
Since it is unlikely that the priest will ever practice his ministry again, what happens to him? Rhetorical question, but I am uneasy with the idea that we simply throw people away.
Katherine - at least in the case you linked to, the case of the priest in question seems to have been handled the right way: the review board looked at the allegations and didn't find them serious enough to recommend removal; and the police were informed, investigated, and elected not to charge the priest. As you say, a gray area. As I read the article, the bishop made a difficult decision. That is why he gets to sit in the big chair. If we feel uneasy about that decision, it may reflect an uneasiness with a zero tolerance policy. Tom has spoken up more than once in favor of forgiveness. At the same time, the history of the abuse crises in the US is not littered but blanketed of cases of bishops being too lenient. I'm not going to criticize this decision.
DeleteJim, I agree that the archbishop is in a difficult position, and is probably handling it as best he can.
DeleteBut we still need to think about forgiveness, which needn't include returning a priest to ministry. I would be in favor of helping someone who isn't guilty of a crime with job retraining in another field so that they can at least earn a living. I don't know what the policy is, maybe the archdiocese is already doing this.
Personally, I wouldn't leap to the conclusion that everyone who can do the job in the US is tainted. I'd look first to reform the process within the Holy See by which bishops are appointed. Letters of recommendation (or more subtle signals of approval in the smoking room of the Old Boys Clubhouse) from the likes of Law and McCarrick may have carried considerably more weight than, in retrospect, they should have. This is something that Francis can address: put people in the Congregation for Bishops who are competent and trustworthy. If the Wikipedia page for the Congregation is current, Cardinal Wuerl is still on the Congregation and is the only American. I don't wish to be too hard on him, but that's not a good appearance.
ReplyDeleteNot a good appearance, true. But am I not right that the ever so more Catholic than the pope Cardinal Burke was head of that commission at the time the cover-up artists were appointed? I can't imagine him exposing anyone whose annointed hands have touched the lace, and would his apples fall very far from the tree?
DeleteTom - Burke was on the commission for a few years, basically during Benedict's reign. He wasn't actually the head of it; if Wikipedia is to be believed, no American ever has had a leadership role on it. Burke was the head of the Apostolic Signatura, the 'court of final appeal' in the Holy See's legal/juridical apparatus.
DeleteWhether being on a dicastery makes you able to pull strings on that dicastery is something I'm never sure of; how Rome actually works is completely opaque to me. If you believe stuff you read, Cardinal McCarrick, who I don't believe ever was a member of the Congregation for Bishops, was a heavyweight influencer in who got to be made bishop and who got promoted to the plum sees in the US.
DeleteWell, DC archdiocese is responding now
Although the pastor of the church did not.
Anne, that DC story you've pointed us to is both awful and interesting. The abuse is awful, and every bit as bad is that apparently neither the pastor nor the child protection coordinator followed the diocesan guidelines to report the offender. It's right that they're removed and suspended.
DeleteInteresting in that the archdiocese heard about it from the Capuchins. This is one of those religious-order cases as in Buffalo.
I'm just speculating here: it seems quite possible to me that the Capuchins have their own process for reporting abuse up through the order's chain of command, and the pastor, who presumably is a Capuchin, followed that process - but apparently not the archdiocesan process (which typically would involve notifying the diocese's child protection director and the independent review board). This is where the "dotted line" mentioned in the original post comes into play: I'd think that the Capuchins running that parish/shrine would be required to report both to their order *and* to the local bishop (as well as the district's DCFS and presumably the police).
The problem is that bishops are appointed in Rome, so it is very mmurky as to who is responsible for them, e.g. Apostolic Delegate who prepares the files on potential candidates, the Congregation of Bishop's process, or other people who have a word with those who are close to the Pope, (what was known as the "apartment" under JP20. McCarrick influence was at the apartment level. He was a favorite of JP2, or at least of the "apartment" if we are trying to shied the saint.
ReplyDeleteWhen bishops are chosen by a synod as in the Eastern Rites (and then approved by Pope), you may not get a better candidate but it is much easier to know whom to blame, i.e. the bishops who elected him. If McCarrick was up for election as Archbishop of DC, I think there would have been enough people who had knew about the rumors that he would not have been elected. When you have local electors bishops are much more likely to make discrete inquires of other bishops rather than relying on information in folders.
CNS story in NCR: "Buffalo bishop responds to criticism, says he has no plans to resign" https://www.ncronline.org/news/accountability/buffalo-bishop-responds-criticism-says-he-has-no-plans-resign
ReplyDelete