BishopAccountability.org
	Episcopal Bishop Charles E. Bennison Jr. Is under Fire over His Brother's Misconduct By David O'Reilly Philadelphia Inquirer [Pennsylvania] October 29, 2006 http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/local/15873270.htm Episcopal Bishop Charles E. Bennison Jr. is used to church conservatives' denouncing him as a "false teacher" and a "heretic" because of his liberal views on gay clergy, gay marriage and Scripture. Now moderates and fellow liberals in his five-county, 55,000-member Diocese of Pennsylvania are taking the gloves off, too. Saying they are frustrated with his financial practices and "imperious" management style, some clergy and lay leaders are seeking to oust the 62-year-old bishop with evidence that he concealed his brother's sexual abuse of a 14-year-old girl more than 30 years ago. The abuse occurred under Bennison's watch; his brother, John, served as youth director of the California parish where Charles Bennison was rector. After learning of the abuse, Bennison never reported it to law enforcement or church officials. His brother went on to become a priest and have sexual relations with multiple parishioners before being defrocked this year. Charles Bennison's critics said they were spreading word of his past because they believe he has bungled his job as bishop here. "We're not out to injure the diocese," said Ray Kraftson, a Villanova-based lawyer and venture capitalist who is leading the charge. "We're trying to rescue it," Kraftson said in an mid-October interview and meeting he hosted at the Merion Cricket Club, where he is a member. "After 10 years, all we have is chaos. There is no trust," said the Rev. Reed Brinkman, rector of St. James parish in Kingsessing. Concerned Pennsylvania Episcopalians, an ad hoc group of diocesan laity and clergy formed about a year ago in response to Bennison's parish closings, is conducting three "forums" on the apparent abuse cover-up next weekend. The Rev. Judith Beck, cochair of CPE and moderator of the forums, said she hoped the revelations would compel the bishop to resign "on behalf of his victims." Both John Bennison's ex-wife and the mother of his teenage victim say they plan to participate in the forums. Under the canons of the Episcopal Church USA, a bishop can be forced from office only for immorality or malfeasance - high crimes of which Charles Bennison is not accused. A former rector and seminary professor, Bennison was selected 10 years ago this month to head the diocese, which comprises Philadelphia, Montgomery, Delaware, Bucks and Chester Counties. In two recent interviews, the bishop was emphatic that he learned of his brother's sexual relationship with the teenager long after it was over. "I had no consciousness of it until the mother of the girl told me," he said. He said he was "shocked and stressed" and immediately confronted his brother, who, he said, denied the charges. "I told him to leave the parish," Bennison said. But the victim, her mother, and a former member of the parish said in interviews that they believe Charles Bennison knew of the relationship while it was going on, and that he did nothing to halt it. Bennison described the situation with his brother as "complicated." "I'm not sure I even knew then that there were reporting laws," Bennison said, adding that in the 1970s "we didn't know the damaging nature" of adult molestation of minors. The troubles began in 1972, when Charles Bennison - then the 28-year-old rector of St. Mark's parish in Upland, Calif. - hired John, 25, as parish youth director. John Bennison, at the time, was a married seminary student preparing for the priesthood. Within months of arriving at St. Mark's, John Bennison started an affair with a young adult parishioner, and in the spring of 1973 began having sex with a 14-year-old. The victim, now in her mid-40s and married with three grown children, said she and John Bennison were twice interrupted during sex by Charles Bennison's arrival at his brother's apartment. "There was a mad dash to reassemble clothing, and then Chuck walked in to find us breathless and disheveled," she wrote in an e-mail to The Inquirer. "If [Charles Bennison] says that he didn't know anything... then he is either lying or very very stupid," she wrote. Ann Pottorff, who was a vestry member at St. Mark's in the 1970s, said she approached Charles Bennison after being told about the relationship by her teenage son. Bennison "didn't seem to take it seriously, or wasn't surprised," she said. Asked in a recent interview if he had been aware of the relationship, Charles Bennison said no. "Well, you don't suspect your brother of sexual misconduct," he said with a shrug. "It was part of my naivete at the time." In June 1975, John Bennison was ordained in the Diocese of Los Angeles by his father, the Rt. Rev. Charles E. Bennison Sr., bishop of Western Michigan. Three months later, John Bennison left St. Mark's to become a curate in a Santa Barbara parish, where he later acknowledged having other affairs. His young victim visited him about once a month before she discontinued the sexual relationship in 1976, when she was 18 and starting college. It was not until Easter 1978, when she was going through profound emotional distress, that she told her parents. In a handwritten letter composed after being confronted by the girl's parents, Charles Bennison acknowledged having known of the relationship for "months" but said that "to tell you... was out of the question." "By the time I found out about what John had done... they had broken up - as far as I knew. To have told you then would have been a case of drudging up dirty history..." In the letter, he urged the family to write to his brother but said he did not wish to read their letters to him. "I have to be, not a pastor, but John's brother, in this situation." In a 1979 letter to his brother's former wife, Bennison urged her not to visit his parish, fearing "a public scandal here which, I believe, could cost me my job." The victim was for many years bulimic, anorexic and suicidal, and abused alcohol, but has largely healed, according to her family. She declined to be interviewed directly, saying in an e-mail that talking about this time in her life was like "standing before a firing squad." Sitting in a red leather wing chair by the fireplace of his office at Church House in Society Hill, the bishop said that he had no plans to step down and that he believed he would be vindicated over time. Bennison said he had "little to do" with his brother, calling his misbehaviors and defrocking a "huge sadness in our whole family." He said that out of deference to the victim and her family he did not want to discuss the abuse and its aftermath in great detail. Joey Piscitelli, cochair of the San Francisco-area chapter of the Survivors' Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP), last week said he believed Charles Bennison's failure to report his brother was inexcusable. "His brother was committing a crime, and he was covering for his brother, and that's a crime. To say there was no need to report it is baloney," said Piscitelli, who earlier this year led SNAP's effort to remove John Bennison from St. John's parish in Clayton, Calif., where he had been rector since 1982. David Clohessy, national director of SNAP, said last week he thought "there should be consequences" for Charles Bennison. He "at least has the moral obligation to publicly come clean," Clohessy said, "to disclose fully his complicity, to reach out to his brother's victims, and directly apologize and make amends to them and lead by example." Contact staff writer David O'Reilly at 215-854-5723 or doreilly@phillynews.com.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.