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	The Soul of a Bishop By Rod Dreher Beliefnet December 3, 2009 http://blog.beliefnet.com/crunchycon/2009/12/the-soul-of-a-bishop.html The New York Times has a look at newly released depositions in Catholic priest sex abuse cases from Bridgeport, Conn., which give us a look into the mind of Bishop Edward Egan, who would go on to become the Cardinal Archbishop of New York. This is very telling: Near the end of the long questioning, Bishop Egan and a plaintiff's lawyer came to loggerheads over the meaning of numbers. "Bishop Egan, the fact that 19 individuals have come forward and made claims," Ms. Robinson asked about Father Pcolka's case. "You don't consider that to be a significant number of individuals?" The bishop waited while his lawyer quibbled over the number 19, then answered that considering there were 360,911 registered Catholics in the diocese, "I do not consider that a significant segment or factor." "Would you agree with me, Bishop Egan," the lawyer pressed, "that if one person, one individual, has been affected by the sexual abuse of a clergy member, when that person was a child, that that's far too much to accept in any diocese?" "It would not be a significant portion of the diocese," he replied. "Your question was 'a significant portion of the diocese.' " The lawyers were arguing again when the bishop interrupted to clarify his point: "However, were even one person to have been abused sexually, while that one person could not numerically be categorized as a significant portion," he said, "the activity would be significant and more." At that point, both sides agreed to take a break. Let's say you were the father of the 13 year old girl Fr. Pcolka raped, or the mother of the little boy Fr. Pcolka sodomized, or of one of the boys who were compelled by the priest to urinate on him while he giggled in bed. How do you think you would feel knowing that your lawyerly bishop did not consider your child to be "a significant portion of the diocese"? As monstrous as devils like Pcolka were, how do you explain a bishop who is so coldly indifferent to human suffering, especially the suffering of children? It boggles the mind and revolts the conscience. What kind of man thinks this way, and acts like this? I understand it with ordinary bums and conformists and apparatchiks, but a man who is a bishop in the church of Jesus Christ?
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