What Conspiracy?

Ralph Cipriano did a marvelous job covering the sickening sex abuse and cover-up trial in Philadelphia. Up today is a post with some commentary from one of the jurors. She also participates in the thread that follows. This comment about why Msgr wasn’t convicted of conspiracy:

I specifically requested that the foreman send out a question (which he did) asking if the result of a conspiracy was that a child was endangered, did the endangerment also have to be the intent. Judge Sarmina told us that it did, which made it nearly impossible to convict, with the elements that we were given of conspiracy.

Once the trial was over, I asked one of the D.A.’s why the Conspiracy was to EWOC (endangering the welfare of children). He stated that every conspiracy has to have a goal. Well why on
earth didn’t they charge him with Conspiracy to commit fraud, or something like that?

Good question. I don’t think any bishop or bureaucrat conspired to harm children. They conspired with one another to keep quiet, cross their fingers, and hope the moral formation of seminary would finally take. That children were harmed by the repeated shuttling of predators and the cover-up of their crimes was a tragic “accident” of the system. Unless, of course, there’s a bishop out there who wants to dispute that.

 

Priest: Employee or Office Holder?

This illustrates a serious quandry for the bishops: do they fight legal definitions? Any by doing so, do they express an adequate theology of the Church? Win or lose, have they set a moral (forget the canonical) precedent? Or, can secular lawyers consult canon law and church documents to learn what the institution really thinks of the relationship between bishops and clergy, not to mention pope and bishops? Finally, what impact do legal fights like this have on the morale of the clergy and laity?

Jimmy Mac sent me a link to this article from the Tablet, in which the British diocese of Portsmouth was found it can be held liable for the actions of abusive clergy. Summing up:

In November last year the High Court ruled that the diocese could be held liable because the relationship between a bishop and a priest is “akin to employment”.

The diocese appealed and in a judgement released today the Court of Appeal ruled the diocese is liable.

In a statement, the trustees of the diocese said the case raises questions of wider legal importance for the Church and the voluntary sector. They stressed that the case was not an attempt to avoid paying compensation to victims – they say they regularly pay damages to victims with valid claims – but rather about establishing an important legal point.

Bishops are moved at the request of the pope. Clergy, too, at the direction of their bishops. In the news recently, we know that bishops can be fired by the pope. Most of the headlines on this one spoke of a “rare show of authority.” Rare? Is this true? We know that bishops muzzle priests, like this one.

I’m certainly aware that Rome takes sacramental matters with grave seriousness. It should. But moral matters like the sexual predation on the innocent have their own sense of gravity. Sexual predation has shown it knows no ideology. Prominent conservative priests and bishops have been caught up in the whirlwind. Nobody seriously suggests that the sexual abuse of children is a immoral domino at the end of a chain that started with Vatican II reform.

It’s time for the institution to add sex abuse and its coverup to the list of “rare show of authority.” It is demonstrable that Catholics across the ideological board are alarmed at sex abuse and particularly, its cover-up. It is a demonstrable Scriptural point that God detests the obstruction of faith by leadership, above and beyond serious liturgical offenses. It seems clear that hundreds of thousands of believers have left the Church or limited their involvement not because of the occasional abuser, but because of the institutional cover-up.

My question of the day for bishops and for the institution: Do you believe in the grace of contrition or not?

 

 

Msgr Lynn Stays Imprisoned

Judge Sarmina denies the defense request to allow Msgr William Lynn to await sentencing while under house arrest. Defense attorney Thomas Bergstrom:

If he were any other defendant he’d be out on bail. I don’t think he should be treated any differently. I think he’s entitled to (house arrest).

Mr Bergstrom is perhaps correct for a non-cleric. Other accused priests have fled as far away as they could. Ways and means of going on the lam and living more comfortably than under overpasses are somewhat greater than for the average lay person. We all know Cardinal Law hightailed it to Rome after his resignation. Has he ever returned to the US? For vacation? To visit family and friends?

Defense attorney Jeff Lindy:

 ((T)he monsignor was also left feeling like the fall guy.) He’s upset because he’s seems to have the weight of the church on his shoulders.

The Church did pay for his legal defense. But indeed, he very much seems like the fall guy. If his testimony and that of others on Cardinal Bevilacqua had held up in a jury’s mind, then it would have been the deceased archbishop going to prison for a term a bit longer than three-and-a-half to seven years. Msgr Lynn is one man convicted for the endangerment of one child. There were thousands of children abused. Is the hierarchy prepared to send some of its own to prison for the equivalent of thousands of years?

I was struck that one of Msgr Lynn’s attorneys offered to serve sentence in his place were he to escape house arrest. I wonder how many bishops would put themselves in the same position.

 

The Groomed Leader

Word is out that Penn State personnel first considered turning coach Jerry Sandusky over to the authorities when a graduate assistant caught him in the act. But then attempted to resolve the accusation internally.

CNN thinks Joe Paterno could be behind the change of heart.

 (Former Athletic Director Tim) Curley allegedly writes: “After giving it more thought and talking it over with Joe yesterday, I am uncomfortable with what we agreed were the next steps.”

The coach is dead. Like Cardinal Bevilacqua in eastern Pennsylvania. So it seems to be a bit convenient for the living if the deceased person take as much of the hit as possible.

On the other hand, I’m not surprised that people at the top are inclined to defend subordinates, especially if the abuse of the weak is out of direct sight. It can happen in a lot of ways, none of which are particularly moral or just. But they happen nonetheless.

Clergy and sports are subcultures of great insularity. So people defend their own against outside threats.

Addicts actively groom allies. If you’ve ever been a friend of an abuser, you might have gotten the drift. The best allies are at the top. Abusers who fail to charm their superiors just turn out to be creeps. But it’s hard for the big cheese’s friend to be called out as a creep.

Preying on children is so far beyond the imagination of some people, it’s just easier to imagine it’s all a big mistake and not go into dangerous territory.

I recognize the above three scenarios are not just, right, or logical. But they involve excuses I’ve heard and read about. I think leadership requires a vigilance not unlike that of a virtuous person who continually examines her or his own life.

For those of us on the outside, it remains important to be supportive of witnesses. It can be very difficult to do the right thing, especially when so many cultural and personal forces array against a person of conscience.

 

Philadelphia Conviction and Convictions

Ralph Cipriano reports on his blog of the legal resolution in Philadelphia. One convicted enabler goes to jail. One accused abuser is free.

Msgr William Lynn couldn’t hide:

The monsignor had his back to courtroom spectators, but everybody could see the back of his neck and his ears turning bright red.

Moments later, family members wept silently as the monsignor was led away by sheriff’s deputies. “Oh God,” one young woman sobbed. His shame was now complete. Lynn would spend the night as the newest inmate at the Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility, known as CFCF, at 7901 State Road in Northeast Philadelphia.

I feel for the man. I know what it is like to have one’s capillaries tell the world what one’s words don’t or won’t say.

Msgr Lynn and his defense team said that the archbishop was calling the shots. And the chancery bureaucrat was just following orders. The jury found the man not guilty of conspiracy, but did find him culpable for returning a predator to parish ministry–where the perpetrator abused again.

Obedience is overblown as a virtue. Perhaps that’s easy for me, as a dissenter, to say. I think obedience is part of a package deal for the believer. It’s not just about our response to authority. It’s not about making life easier on our supervisors, bosses, pastors, bishops, and popes. It’s not about toughening our egos and setting aside narcissism. I’m convinced that obedience is better placed in the context of a greater responsibility to our community.

As a parent I have difficult, distasteful, and anti-ego responsibilities to my daughter. I do things not because she commands, but because they are needful. I muster an obedient response to the duties I have as a father. Other people, too, for the relationships I have: my wife, my pastor, my parishioners, my extended family, my friends, my neighborhood, and so forth. And I bring an appropriate attitude with each of these. I pay taxes obediently because I respect the government I have elected to do their duty to me and to my sister and brother citizens. I am free to complain, protest, and lobby for change. That doesn’t make me less obedient, only more responsible.

Suppose my daughter is having a difficult day, and I take over her chores to make sure the pets get fed. I perform that duty with as much joy as I can muster. But when the test is complete, things are restored. Or if she has sassed me during this time, we will address the matter when it is likely to be effective.

This is what servant leadership is about. This is what John 13 is about. This is why saints got down on their knees and served. This is why people who sat on thrones and sycophants surrounding them are not invoked at baptism.

Getting back to Msgr Lynn, he was disobedient in keeping counsel to himself on the predator priest in question. He may well have been smoothing over his relationship with his bishop. But he was being disobedient as a citizen, disobedient as a priest, disobedient to Christ, and disobedient to the hundreds of thousands of lay people in his diocese. He took the easy way out. He said little. He did not protest. Today he is on the receiving end of a brutal punishment. Either he is a liar, or his bishops should be serving prison time in his stead for their criminal, sinful, and antigospel policies. Either way, this is a very sad day for the Church and for the presbyterate. It should be a gravely sad day for bishops, but I don’t think they quite get it yet.

People in Msgr Lynn’s situation who stand up to authority as obedient Christians, have an opportunity for sainthood. Who ever remembers the wicked on the lists of the Church’s martyrology?

Much earlier in our marriage, when the young miss was much younger, I was confronted with a situation of unfairness and injustice. My wife could have counseled me to keep quiet and not stirred the pot. But she did not. She knew the cost of standing up to authority, and I knew I could not live with myself for allowing a friend to be bullied in a situation that had gotten out of hand. It made for a very rough time with the pastor for the next few months, but it was the right thing to do. Even if it might have possibly cost me my employment.

When I go home at night, my daughter is not aware of the decisions I make daily to live as a Christian adult. But I know that even if the capillaries are not broadcasting heat in my skin, I have an obedient responsibility to my family as a Christian man above my responsibility as a provider. I would rather be pushing a grocery cart through the streets, homeless, than to live in a prison of my own making for not standing up to injustice. Those words might be brave enough, as I’ve not had to deal with a job-or-else situation in many, many years.

And what has been accomplished by keeping quiet in Philadelphia? Whole diocesan ministries dismantled from the top. 117 years of print publishing comes to an end. Dozens of jobs lost by people who likely understood what mandatory reporting looks like. There’s a certain brutality in that, don’t you think? Eleven million for legal defense–imagine if penitents brought that sort of money before the Lord, instead of just uttering a three-fold mea culpa.

 

Around the Episcopacy

Cleveland’s Bishop Richard Lennon is reaching out to his priests.

I have become aware of a growing disconnect between many of the priests who serve faithfully in this diocese and myself. It saddens me to hear reports that a number of our priests feel anxious and uncomfortable in my presence and that rather than being co-workers with me, a number of priests feel left out of consultation.

Awareness, especially self-awareness is absolutely vital in ministry. Knowing one’s weaknesses involves the basic examination of conscience and subsequent confession. But it’s more than cataloguing the number of impure thoughts, white lies, and missed opportunities of charity. Not knowing Bishop Lennon at all, to appearances, this could be a sincere reaching out. The man supposedly invited a fellow bishop to assess his leadership last year. He has said he would not contest the reopening of parishes. Should his clergy take him at his word? A seemingly heartfelt statement:

Know I am entering this process willingly and open to change. Please join me in this sincere effort to improve the spirit, communication and trust in our relationship.

Charity and the relationship in ministry obligates. But this would be a last chance type of effort. If this outreach–and I mean what takes place beyond and behind the group meetings–fails, then the familial schism will likely not be healed. On the other hand, no Catholic can reject the opportunity for redemption.

On the other hand, Cardinal Dolan seems to have landed himself hip-deep in something that’s not yet a scandal and not quite a difference of opinion. Mark Silk seems to have the measure of the situation. Is the bishop who most thought was a can’t-miss jovial face for American Catholicism finding it hard to tread treacherous waters? Giving money to a sex offender priest: many sensibilities are offended. What is the boundary line between charity and a pay-off?

Many of those outraged at episcopal mismanagement might want clergy offenders paraded through life in an orange jumpsuit. Or wearing a scarlet S for all to see. A ten- or twenty-thousand dollar check is pretty nice, however you define it.

If I were paying closer attention to the New York prelate, I’d listen for tone of voice and watch body language. Does he exude a sense of peace and calm about how he has conducted himself as a personnel manager making tough decisions? Or does he come off as shrill and defensive? I’d want to have more than just what I read in the blogs. Here, too, I respect a man who makes an effort at reform and renewal. He’s been public about losing weight. I can totally understand that struggle. But the believer can also become bloated with lies, falsehoods, and words that lead others away from the truth. How does one shed that sort of excess weight?

Many correspondents suggested I check out Max Lindenman’s latest post on bishops and paranoia. As the token liberal at the Patheos Catholic Channel, I often wish his input there would match the relentless tone amassed by many conservatives there. When I read his words on paranoia, I was thinking more of the bishops as products of a culture of narcissism. The secular culture they were raised in as Americans is undeniably self-focused. Two, there’s the Catholic sense of entitlement. Then you throw in seminary training. And the way people seem to get appointed to sees, not to mention the George Jefferson methodology for upward mobility … It might be a minor miracle these guys aren’t worse than they are. Cardinal George, long/once thought to be the intellectual fulcrum for the USCCB is quoted:

I expect to die in bed, my successor will die in prison and his successor will die a martyr in the public square.

Right. If this prophecy comes to pass, it will be because successor number one will have been convicted of child endangerment. Or that successor number two will get mugged by his own clergy and/or laity.

And lastly, when I think about the Philadelphia trial of Msgr Lynn, one commentator nailed it as a lose-lose for the archdiocese. What a choice: Cardinal Bevilacqua was a heartless dictator, or the clergy screening bad behavior were giving the brothers a friendly pass. It looks bad for the episcopacy any way you slice it.

Is there a bright side to any of this? Any hint of metanoia could be, must be the grace of the Holy Spirit.

 

A Small Legal Adjustment

Bishop Finn appoints away some episcopal authority. Or does he? In the old days (of JPII) it was Rome who appointed co-adjutors to ride to the rescue. In the 21st century, I guess this is left to western bishops to work out their own messes.

David Gibson has the piece up at both RNS and dotCommonweal.

Jack Smith, diocesan newspaper editor and once-active blogger, explains:

Fr. Rush’s sole responsibility is to make decisions with regard to resolving a misdemeanor charge against the diocese in Jackson County. In all but this matter, Bishop Finn continues in all of his duties.

There is a perceived conflict that this helps resolve. Bishop Finn and the diocese each have been charged with identical misdemeanors in Jackson County. It is possible that the defense or resolution of one charge could be in conflict with the defense or resolution of the other charge. For this reason a Vicar has been appointed with authority to independently represent diocesan interests with regard to the charge against the diocese.

So it seems less a matter of canon law and more one of secular legality.

I see my friend Msgr Murphy has returned to full-time parish ministry–no more VG work for him. That should be a relief to the man. I always had a sense he saw the role of the priest–his own best, gifted role–was as a parish pastor. While I have no particular inside knowledge on this situation, I do know that Bishop Finn kept his own counsel on priest appointments. If he had made up his mind that any offending priest could be rehabilitated, no number of committees or clergy could sway his judgment.

 

No Mercy

Philadelphia blogger Ralph Cipriano isn’t sure the prosecution is on the right track in Msgr Lynn’s trial. The defendant takes the stand this week, and ADA Patrick Blessington is showing no mercy.

Blessington could have dissected Lynn on the facts, but instead he chose to repeatedly insult and demean a man in a priest’s collar who wasn’t fighting back. It seemed like the ideal way to create sympathy for Lynn among jurors. It may be the only way the defense has left to possibly win the case.

There were other bureaucrats who were “higher up” than Msgr Lynn. One’s dead, and the other two aren’t part of these proceedings.

The dead cardinal, Anthony Bevilacqua, continues to get thrown under the bus.

(Mr Blessington) cited a handwritten note that he thought Molloy had written on a 1991 memo from Lynn. “Unnecessary statement,” the note said. “Never admit to victims that there are other cases.”

That wasn’t Molloy’s handwriting, Lynn told Blessington, that was Cardinal Bevilacqua’s handwriting. That caused a stir in the courtroom, as Lynn dropped the dime on his dead boss. Bevilacqua was found dead on Jan. 31, a day after Judge M. Teresa Sarmina ruled the cardinal was competent to testify as a witness at this trial.

You did whatever the cardinal told you to do, Blessington asked.

“I did do what the cardinal asked,” Lynn said.

Blessington asked if Lynn had ever lied to victims of sex abuse. Only once, Lynn said. Blessington sneered at that. The prosecutor charged that Lynn had also routinely lied to parishioners by not usually telling them the real reason that abuser priests were being removed from parishes, so they could be shipped out to sex clinics for psychiatric evaluations. But parishioners were told the priest had Lyme disease, Blessington said, or that Father was leaving for health reasons.

“The cardinal wouldn’t allow me to announce why someone was leaving,” Lynn responded. And the dead cardinal took another hit.

It’s got to be difficult in the Loggia, covering this trial with the pounding of catastrophic testimony.

Not long after Msgr William Lynn became the first US church official to be charged with facilitating a cover-up of abuse cases, word swirled among his Philadelphia confreres that “If Bill goes down, he’s taking everyone with him.”

What does Rock mean? His archdiocese? All the vicars general, and other high-placed bureaucrats around the country?

Since beginning trial in late March, the longtime Secretary for Clergy of the roiled Northeastern archdiocese has mostly sat expressionless, slumped in his chair at the defense table as a parade of witnesses and reams of Chancery files gave detailed accounts of “powder keg” priests, gut-wrenching romps by serial predators, and at least one cleric whose perceived “disobedience” was dealt with more swiftly and severely by his superiors than seemingly any had been over reports of misconduct with minors.

That last one’s going to bite the bishops, to be sure. Certainly there are important non-sexual matters dogging the Church’s mission. But doubt is widespread from this crisis, and eroding support for bishops is widespread across ideology and intentional practices among the faithful.

While Msgr Lynn’s supporters are bringing rosaries to pray during the trial, I can imagine a bishop’s appeal to pray might well be redirected elsewhere by many in the flock. People also get discouraged and leave the Church. Bishop candidates may wonder why they would leave a pastorate, or more likely a bureaucrat’s chancery desk to clean up someone else’s mess somewhere. Or perhaps the path to the cathedra is one way out of being a yes-man in a moral food chain that would seem to wear down any morals-driven person.

 

Not (Just) Employer

Jimmy Mac sent me this link to The Tablet with a legal defense for a British diocese:

The diocese of Portsmouth this week insisted that a priest accused of abusing a child was employed “in the service” of God, not by the diocese.

…

As it was a preliminary hearing on the case, the court was not tasked with judging the truth of the woman’s allegations, but ruled instead on the question of whether the relationship between a priest and bishop was akin to that between an employer and an employee.

I wonder how often the prosecutors bring up the Church’s own teaching. Christus Dominus 16 is sure to be an eye-opener for the legal world, not to mention a few bishops:

Let (bishops) be true fathers who excel in the spirit of love and solicitude for all and to whose divinely conferred authority all gratefully submit themselves. Let them so gather and mold the whole family of their flock that everyone, conscious of his own duties, may live and work in the communion of love.

…

Bishops should always embrace priests with a special love since the latter to the best of their ability assume the bishops’ anxieties and carry them on day by day so zealously. They should regard the priests as sons and friends (Cf. John 15:15) and be ready to listen to them. Through their trusting familiarity with their priests they should strive to promote the whole pastoral work of the entire diocese.

They should be solicitous for the spiritual, intellectual and material welfare of the priests so that the latter can live holy and pious lives and fulfill their ministry faithfully and fruitfully.

…

With active mercy bishops should pursue priests who are involved in any danger or who have failed in certain respects.

Here’s what I see in the bishop:

• They are tasked with being “fathers” in a “family” of members that “live and work in (a) communion.”
• Their relationship with priests is described as a mutuality not only in ministry, but of cares, of listening, and of respect.
• They share with the clergy “the whole pastoral work of the entire diocese.”
• Their concern is wide-ranging and goes beyond the work their priests do.
• A troubled priest is a target of “active” concern–even pursuit.

Is a bishop responsible? Darn right he is. It goes with the job, and it certainly is intimiately entangled with the nature of the episcopal ministry as the Catholic church teaches and understands it. Is the bishop an employer? That and much, much more. Bishop Hollis should know this.

 

More Trouble for the Legion

The AP released the news, hopped on by just about every Catholic outlet in the world over the past twenty-four hours, that the curia is pondering a small stack of dossiers in its possession:

(T)he Legion (of Christ) confirmed it had referred seven cases of alleged abuse to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican office that investigates sex crimes. All but one involves alleged abuse dating from decades ago; one case involves recent events.

More from the Legion’s statement:

While the priests are under investigation, their access to children has been restricted.

I wonder how strict the restriction is. I hope orthodoxically strict, as in a far sight better than Bishop Finn’s solution.

As bad as the crimes of individual predators may be, the seemingly-inevitable cover-up is far worse:

The scandal of Maciel and the Legion ranks as one of the worst of the 20th-century Catholic Church, since he was held up as a model for the faithful by Pope John Paul II. The orthodox order, which has about 900 priests around the world, was praised for attracting both money and vocations to the priesthood.

Documentation from Vatican archives, however, has shown that as early as the 1950s, the Vatican had evidence that he was a drug addict and pedophile.

Only in 2006 did the Vatican sanction Maciel to a lifetime of penance and prayer for his crimes. He died in 2008 and a year later the Legion admitted he had fathered three children with two different women and had abused his seminarians.

The Vatican took over the Legion in 2010 and is pushing through a process of reform.

Even conservative Catholics in the blogosphere are suggesting words like “suppression” in connection with the Legion. Of course, they’re also swimming in dozens of vocations to cloistered life, so they also say the same thing about the LCWR. On the former suppression, I’m a skeptic, and here ‘s why:

Maybe it lets the Legion off too easily. There’s probably little hope of imposing a new charism on the community. But suppose its ministries were re-ordered to focus on advocacy for victims, and rooting out scandal within the Church. Suppose its fundraising prowess and stockpiles of resources were placed at the service of victims and their legal counsel. And dioceses that were found to offend and might find other ministries devalued through no fault of their own. Suppose the founder were held up as an example of don’t-do-this. From John Paul II’s 2001 address:

In a secularized world such as our own, built in large part on neglect of transcendent truths and values, the faith of many of our brothers and sisters is sorely tried. Because of this, there is a need today more than ever for a confident proclamation of the Gospel which, casting aside all crippling fears, announces with intellectual depth and with courage the truth about God, about (people), about the world.

Let’s be clear that a sign of neglect of these values is in the cronyism, materialism, and secrecy that often accompanies the cover-up of predation in the Church. Preaching the truth, speaking the truth: these are charism the Church needs. Why not let the LC continue if they would re-order their efforts at this? Otherwise, perhaps the whole thing should be erased.

 

A Tale of Two Testimonies

I’ve been dropping in daily at the blog covering the Philadelphia cover-up trial. Yesterday’s post included coverage of a sister’s testimony. Speaking of Msgr William Lynn when pressed by defense counsel to admit the priest had no power to influence clergy assignments, the rape victim testified:

He [Lynn] had the power to suggest it.

(Instead of going along with the power structure), you can also say, I cannot do this.

Blogger Ralph Cipriano:

It was a simple, but powerful declaration coming from a nun who herself was an administrator down at archdiocese HQ, and also as a young woman, a victim of sex abuse from a pervert priest.

More from the witness:

I would think that his [Lynn's] recommendation would be heard. (And if it wasn’t, Lynn could have told the cardinal,) “I cannot go on; if it isn’t done that way, I can quit.”

In contrast, a spoonful of sugar from Bishop Robert Lynch is mentioned by CNS, but the original thoughts are here on his blog.

More from Mr Cipriano:

The nun’s firm but understated conviction about the need to simply do the right thing sent a ripple of excitement through courtroom spectators, which included victims of sex abuse, and activists hoping for the impossible, reform in the Roman Catholic Church. It also raised an age-old question, namely why do the women in the Catholic church usually have more balls than the men?

I’d say it’s a tendency, not a hard fact. Some women are indeed weaker than men. But among church leadership, I’d say the majority of comparisons do not come out well for the bishops. I think there are some reasons for this.

One-hundred percent of the sisters of the LCWR are in religious life. A minority of clergy are. There’s a different quality in one’s faith life when you are responsible to a community, and when you are responsible to a chain of command. In a community, or even a family, one is responsible for and to a number of others. There’s a mutuality that forms an adult in a different way of life. To their detriment, most diocesan clergy live a life of a hermit. The best priests turn that to their advantage. Others wallow in isolation. What community is left but to play the games of careerism?

A lay person in a family or a sister in a community is involved in a give-and-take that generally involves more mutuality. We know the meaning of sacrifice. The kind of sacrifice involved in the burial of secrets is to one’s soul. The anonymous sister on the witness stand understands this a bit better than a well-placed cleric in a chancery.

This is likely why many of us lay people find ourselves outraged at the turn of events with the LCWR and the bishops. I actually feel more sorry for the bishops than I feel angry at them. The Gospel: they don’t get it.

 

 

Onward To Trial, Bishop Finn

To begin with, a person’s lawyer is entitled to locate and utilize any lawful defense. So I don’t have a problem with Bishop Finn’s lawyers suggesting that mandatory reporting statutes are vague. It’s an ironic twist that the Planned Parenthood legal team used the same defense in 2006. And this case was cited in yesterday’s legal ruling that Bishop Finn will have to stand trial. The news was picked up yesterday by CNS.

And so we enter another period of quiet before the scheduled trial on 24 September. Meanwhile, I see a support site has been opened and is updated regularly.

 

A Tale of Two Bishops

It all depends on whether they’re alive or dead. Mark Silk at RMS spells it all out, and it’s not pretty, by any definition:

At the sexual abuse trial in Philadelphia yesterday, counsel for the defense contended that Msgr. William J. Lynn, whose job it was to oversee the archdiocese’s 800 priests, should not be held responsible for covering up abuse cases because his boss, the late Anthony Bevilacqua, was the “puppet master.” Meanwhile, at the sexual abuse hearing in Kansas City yesterday, counsel for the defense sought dismissal of the coverup indictment of Bishop Robert Finn on the grounds that Finn wasn’t the “designated reporter.”

Alive, you’re not the “designated reporter;” dead, you’re a “puppet master.” Alive, your defense goes after those puppets of anti-Catholicism … SNAP. Dead, and you get thrown under the bus.

Professor Silk worries about the collective credibility of bishops. I still do too. While lawyer tactics over a thousand miles apart don’t have a legal connection, it’s not hard for people to make the moral connection. Over at dotCommonweal, it was easy enough for commenter  Jack Barry to make the canonical connection:

Can. 480 A vicar general and an episcopal vicar must report to the diocesan bishop concerning the more important affairs which are to be handled or have been handled, and they are never to act contrary to the intention and mind of the diocesan bishop.

It would be nice, sometime, someday, to see a bishop jettison his lawyers and just ‘fess up.

 

CitE* Watch: Bridgeport to Baltimore

There were days when the appointment of a bishop in a faraway diocese was no news at all, and barely news within the diocese. A bishop might–might–matter to the clergy. The people? Pshaw.

These days, too many episcopal appointments are big news. The Catechetical One descends on Washington. The Jovial One gets the Apple. The commonalities you can count on is that ordained bishops move from smaller cities to larger ones. Almost never are they appointed from the clergy of a diocese. And sadly, many bishops lack experience as shepherds. They’ve taught in seminaries. They’ve “edited” the diocesan organ. They’ve been in Rome. They’ve taken up desk space in the chancery. Few have pastored large parishes with school, staff, and fifty funerals and thirty weddings a year. And after appointment, many of them rack of frequent flyer miles over continent and ocean. I don’t think this is a good state of affairs for the vitality and leadership of the diocesan Church.

dotCommonweal takes a look at the latest career move, a shift from a small Connecticut city to the mother see of the United States. The comments were even more informative than David Gibson’s short essay. Carolyn Disco provides a tart assessment in two movements treating Bishop Lori’s approach to financial and sex scandals. The overall commentary there is rather bitter. What would have produced shrugs just a generation ago today gets nationwide attention. And sometimes beyond. Is it good for the Church to have episcopal appointments undergoing such scrutiny before the installation incense is ordered? Count me a skeptic. But the truthsaying on these guys, on Bishop Lori, seems clear enough. On finances:

In my opinion, Lori revealed the kind of person he is, never mind the kind of bishop he is, by personally humiliating a whistleblower priest to save his own reputation.

And on stonewalling abuse victims:

Lori fought for the entire first decade of his Bridgeport assignment to keep 12,500 pages of documents secret from the public. The legal meat grinder went all the way to the US Supreme Court where Lori lost.

Still, the bishop unilaterally held back 12% of the total documents to fight on under another creative legal strategy.

…

Lori is so removed from pastoral concern for victim/survivors that he does not even inform them when their perpetrators die. He knew a priest had died but never let the survivor’s family or anyone else know. A justice department official told me that is a pattern for bishops. Tell no one.

We probably need all sorts in the college of bishops. Canon lawyers. Theologians. Liturgists. People good in front of a camera. Pastors. Especially the latter, for that’s more or less what Jesus was, and what he appointed the Twelve to do. Heal the sick, expel a demon or two, build up a local Church here and there. Biblical things.

Now, I certainly understand that as administrators, bishops feel loyal to the material amassings of the institution. As priests, they were formed in a Catholic sub-culture reinforced by communal living at a very formative time in young adulthood. So I appreciate the culture, even if I might see a problem or two in how that culture–and the administration of it–has run off a bit from the original mission.

I don’t offer this essay with much more than the observations. Bishop Lori may or may not have a fine ministry in the years ahead of him in Baltimore. And he may have made a mistake or two in Connecticut. Mistakes are not always sinful. And even if they were, a person may be forgiven, right? On the other hand, in an age where authentic leadership is lacking, it is more than understandable people have questions about their leaders. Nothing’s been quite the same for the past two generations, and people of all ideologies have developed a pervasive lack of trust. I wonder when the bishops will realize the situation.

* Careerism  in the Episcopacy

 

Maciel’s Shadow

Much is being made of the pope not meeting with Mexican abuse victims. Patricio Cerda, who works with victims, strikes a pessimistic tone:

In my opinion it is sad, on the one hand, because Benedict XVI is expected to be more than ‘politically correct’ – he is expected to be a true pastor. On the other hand, the cardinals have their own interests at stake, including the Primate of Mexico (Cardinal Norberto Rivera Carrera), who defended Maciel to the end. Those directly victimized by the founder do not want to become pawns in what amounts to nothing more than a media game.

Political correctness–the worst sense of that term–can run both ways. There’s a certain pc-strain in churchmen who want nothing more for this scandal of abuse and cover-up to go away. Why does it have to drag on past the obligatory fifteen minutes? This nipping at the heels might well devour good efforts in the new evangelization.

But rather than view the situation in defensive terms, the Church could look upon this as an opportunity. Rather than an annoyance, it presents an opening to develop an apostolate or reconciliation, prayer, and giving a good example of asking forgiveness. Maybe the time is no longer ripe for evangelization–at least as the cover-story initiative of Rome. Maybe it’s time for penitence, sacrifice, and contrition.

Think about it: If the pope can’t himself tour the world to the sex-abuse hotspots of Kansas City, Philadelphia, the Netherlands, and the Maciel compound, send some people who will. To heck with the lawyers and just meet simply with the victims. Apologize. Pray. Meet till the anger and betrayal is talked out. Send a bishop or two, too. Better for them to get out an actually minister to harmed people rather than hole up in an Italian basilica.

When helping the young miss clean up her room last week, we uncovered a photo my wife took of her with one of Kansas City’s accused priests. Her “favorite” priest. Until last summer. It was a happier time, but when demons were sub-surface–and who would know from looking at the smiles what lay beneath them?

With our daughter’s permission, I was considering sending the image to Bishop Finn. And adding a tale about a young person who, last year, was still talking about being an altar server. And who now, won’t pick up the MR3 sheet in the pew, and put all the bishop trading cards from NCYC in the trash with that other photo. One of my staff colleagues tried to console me with the thought that “It could also be the age.” And it could be. But I have enough doubt about it to be troubled. Anyway, the post idea is trashed for now–literally. The young miss was only disappointed she didn’t think about burning the photo before tossing it away.

It may yet be that Pope Benedict will carve out some time for victims in his trip to Mexico. He could do worse.