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	Wineke: Sadly, the Parishioners Pay By Bill Wineke Wisconsin State Journal February 15, 2008 http://www.madison.com/wsj/home/column/272721 Of Julius Caesar, Mark Anthony said: "The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred in their bones." Milwaukee's Archbishop Timothy Dolan must cogitate on the truth of Shakespeare's words as he tries to juggle all the balls left in the air by his predecessor, Archbishop Rembert Weakland, who had the unfortunate habit of moving pervert priests from parish to parish. Dolan is now trying to raise money to pay off multi-million dollar settlements to persons harmed by several priests. His diocese faces a $3 million budgetary shortfall this year, which means Dolan will have to curtail services to those Catholics who remain faithful, and his spokesmen warn that further judgments might force the diocese into bankruptcy. Dolan is, at one and the same time, trying to reassure his people that he will be honest and straightforward with them while hoping to block any further suits against the diocese that might tip it over the financial edge. Earlier this year, the archdiocese released 800 pages of material on the Rev. Franklyn Becker, a molester from his seminary days until, decades later, Dolan removed him from ministry in 2002. The material shows that, time after time, the diocesan bishops were warned about Becker and, time after time, they returned him to ministry, where he could continue to prey upon children. "Although there could be various explanations of all the decisions that were made or not made, at the end of the day you will see, I have to admit, these decisions are a particularly ugly example of how the church made some dreadful mistakes in the handling of these cases," Dolan said in a letter to his people. The Archdiocese has also reported there are as many as 40 priests who have been "credibly" accused of sexual misconduct -- but it won't say who they are. At the same time, the diocese is also resisting passage of a law that would extend the statute of limitations to make it possible for people abused by a clergy person to file suit years after the offense. One reason why, "perhaps most importantly, the costs of defending lawsuits and of any damages that might ensue from them is born by innocent third parties, in this case Catholic parishioners who are in no way responsible for mistakes made by others decades ago." Well, yes. The evil that men do lives after them. Dolan is not the perpetrator here. Weakland -- a man I personally revered -- is the bad guy and, yes, the innocent parishioners of the Roman Catholic Church in Milwaukee will suffer from his evil decisions. At the same time, it is this "let bygones by bygones" attitude of so many bishops that allowed the sex abuse to continue in the first place. If the church, rather than the victims, had paid a price years ago, the abusing priests would have been stopped. Sooner or later, a price is paid. It 's too late for sooner.
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