LOWELL (MA)
Lowell Sun
By HIROKO SATO, Sun Staff
LOWELL -- Nowhere in Greater Lowell did the clergy sex-abuse scandal hit home harder than at St. Michael Parish in Lowell's Centralville neighborhood.
The late Rev. Joseph Birmingham is believed to have abused at least a dozen boys while he was assigned there in the 1970s.
So it's no surprise that Cardinal Sean O'Malley is including the church as part of his 10-day pilgrimage of "repentance and hope" to parishes with painful histories of clergy sexual abuse.
O'Malley's "Novena to the Holy Spirit" begins Ascension Thursday, May 25, with a Mass at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston at 7:30 p.m. He will then visit nine parishes before concluding his tour on Pentecost Sunday, June 4, the end of the 50-day Easter season.