-Caveat Lector-
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/world/2002/0126/88408494FR26SMYTHPRIE
ST.html
Cardinal refuses to resign after priest convicted of abuse
By Patrick Smyth, Washington Correspondent
THE US: Following the release of a huge volume of documentation on
the Catholic Church's protection and regular reassignment of a self-
confessed paedophile priest, Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston has again
apologised for his role in the affair but refused to resign.
"My resignation is not part of the solution as I see it," he told a
group of about 520 priests from the Boston area on Thursday. "I want
the archdiocese to become a model for how this issue should be
handled."
"I wish it were possible to go back in time and undo some of the
decisions that I made," he said. But the cardinal has instructed the
clergy of the diocese to comply with a new law requiring them to
report incidents and accusations of abuse, past and present, or known
paedophiles to the police.
The church had fought in the courts to prevent the publication by the Boston Globe of
the documents, mostly affidavits and discovery from pending civil actions. The papers
reflect a similar preoccupation over the years wi
th preventing scandal rather than halting the abuse or bringing the known abuser to
the attention of the authorities.
More than 130 people have alleged that Father John Geoghan, defrocked in 1998,
molested them during a career as a priest of the diocese from 1962 to 1995. The church
has settled 50 lawsuits so far for a total of $10 milli
on; 84 more are pending. Geoghan was convicted last week of one case of molesting a
boy and faces two further criminal trials on similar charges.
"What is striking about the documents that became public this week," the Globe
reports, "is the indifference of the church to the extent of Geoghan's abuse. With
just one exception, the Geoghan records and the transcripts
of depositions of church officials contain no hint that anyone around the cardinal
urged him to remove children from Geoghan's reach until 1993."
The papers reveal repeated attempts to silence parents at the same time as repeated
sympathetic acceptance over the years of assurances from Geoghan, an admitted abuser,
that he was successfully confronting his problems.
In succession, Cardinal Humberto Medeiros and Cardinal Law from 1984 offered him their
prayers, but never condemnation. Even as the prosecutors closed in, Cardinal Law wrote
to Geoghan in 1996: "Yours has been an effectiv
e life of ministry, sadly impaired by illness . . . God bless you, Jack."
In 1989 before moving him to another parish, following new allegations and another
session of "treatment", Cardinal Law would write: "It's most heartening to know that
things have gone well for you and that you are ready
to resume your efforts with renewed zeal."
Bishop Thomas Daily, once deputy to both cardinals and now Bishop of Brooklyn,
acknowledges in an affidavit that he had tried to persuade parents of abused children
not to go public to avoid causing scandal.
One of those relatives wrote to Cardinal Medeiros after that 1982 meeting, complaining
that Dr Daily had suggested "that we keep silent to protect the boys - that is absurd
since minors are protected under law, and I do n
ot wish to hear that remark again, since it is insulting to our intelligence." The
cardinal responded calling the incidents "a very delicate situation and one that has
caused great scandal."
Another relation of several abused children, Ms Margaret Gallant, wrote to his
successor in 1984, to report that Geoghan had recently been seen with many young boys
and to urge action.
Despite the absence of records of abuse during his first 18 years as a priest, from
1962 to 1980, interviews with some of Geoghan's victims and depositions of church
officials show the archdiocese was aware of his abuse o
f children during those years. But Church officials never referred
any allegations of sexual abuse about Geoghan to the authorities.
Instead, they sought to rehabilitate him by placing him on sick
leave, or sending him to local doctors before moving him to another
parish.
� The Irish Times
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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