CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Tribune
By Charles Sheehan, Margaret Ramirez and Carlos Sadovi, Tribune staff reporters. Staff reporter Johnathon E. Briggs and Manya Brachear contributed to this report
Published February 3, 2006
Just hours after Rev. Daniel McCormack appeared in court to face charges of abusing a third boy, a remorseful Cardinal Francis George said Thursday he would immediately reform the monitoring program that should have kept the priest away from children.
Compelled again to speak about a new and widening crisis over the archdiocese's handling of sex abuse allegations against priests, George said he takes the blame for not removing McCormack from ministry when the priest was accused of abuse last August.
George conceded that church officials were ill-prepared to respond to a case where the alleged abuse was occurring now, not decades ago.
"I recognize that I should have found some way to react more aggressively because this was a current allegation, the first one we've had," George said.