USA Today
December 4, 2009
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/Religion/post/2009/12/sex-clergy-abuse-scandal-catholic-church/1
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| Cardinal Edward Egan, shown here waving farewell after celebrating his final Easter Mass as head of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York, is in the news for actions he took -- or failed to take -- to protect minors from sexual abuse by clergy when he was bishop of Bridgeport, Conn. Photo by Patrick Andrade |
The clergy sexual abuse scandal has subsided from the front page headlines it dominated in 2002, but the painful issue is still front burner for survivors -- and bishops -- as the legal story continues to spin out slowly.
This week we have accounts from three directions of bishops past and present who shredded or spurned records of victims and abusive priests.
In Wisconsin, the Pierce County Herald reports:
Former Milwaukee Catholic Archbishop Rembert Weakland shredded copies of reports concerning sexual abuse by priests. That's according to legal depositions Weakland gave in the 1990's testimony that was made public today by the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP).
In Connecticut, a court decision forced the public records of former bishop Edward Egan, now Cardinal Egan, who recently retired from his last post as Archbishop of New York. The New York Times and other media have plowed through the pages and found that Egan, a veteran canon lawyer, barely gave an inch of information in depositions about what he knew, when he knew and what he did with allegations of abuse.
While it may not be evident on paper whether his misdeeds were intentional, his mismanagement, according to media reports of the records, was clear in The Times, and Connecticut press.
The Connecticut Post wrote:
Egan was defensive, evasive and ... appeared complicit in a policy of disinformation concerning the practice of abruptly reassigning priests accused of sexual abuse.
But in New York, Egan's successor, Archbishop Timothy Dolan who came from Milwaukee where he had replaced Weakland, now backs Egan, according to SNAP.
Dolan says Egan "properly dealt with all allegations," according to a statement by Dolan released by SNAP.
SNAP questions if we will ever know what bishops did -- or didn't -- do, beyond their own accounts in laborious annual reports on child protection, when diocesan and legal records are missing, buried or filled with obfuscation?
My question: Will clarity -- or reconciliation -- ever be possible when so many priests and victims have died, disappeared, or remained silent? How much of this is beyond the ability of current bishops, even with the best intentions, to rectify?
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