L.A. Clergy Abuse Records Released, but Will More Facts Emerge?

By Sandra Hernandez
Los Angeles Times
August 1, 2013

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinion-la/la-ol-clergy-abuse-documents-20130731,0,2559360.story

Mary DeSantis, a supporter and victim abused by priests holds quilt depicting pictures at a press conference in Los Angeles

On Wednesday, five Catholic religious orders publicly released some 1,700 pages of personnel files to victims of sexual abuse. The documents, which include myriad records that in some cases detail abuse, are yet another reminder of the vast scope of the clergy abuse scandal that resulted in hundreds of lawsuits against the Roman Catholic Church.

As The Times’ Victoria Kim and Harriet Ryan reported, the newly released files indicate that Father Ruben Martinez, who belonged to the Oblates of Mary Immaculate order, was among the worst offenders.

At 521 pages, Martinez’s file is the longest and chronicles decades of molestation that began soon after his 1968 ordination. In the 1980s, at churches in Pacoima and Wilmington, two mothers raised concerns about Martinez’s behavior with altar boys. But it was several years later, when Martinez himself complained of fatigue and burnout from parish work, that he was sent to therapy at a New Mexico center for troubled clergy.

After completing the treatment in 1991, he was allowed back into ministry by Father Paul Nourie, a newly appointed head of the order, even though Nourie wrote that he had “every reason” to believe the veracity of complaints of Martinez’s “alleged misbehavior with younger males.” Calling him “blessed and gifted,” Nourie sent Martinez to an Imperial Valley church, where he was soon working with youth.

The newly disclosed personnel files are deeply disturbing not just because they indicate that pedophile priests were placed back in the ministry even after problems were brought to the attention of the religious orders, but also because of what they don't disclose. It remains unclear just how much information church officials shared about priests with troubled histories.

According to A.W. Richard Sipe, a former Benedictine monk turned counselor, religious orders normally operate independently of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles. But the orders are required to share information with the archdiocese when they send a priest to work in parishes in Southern California.

Typically, such information would have been shared when the religious order sent a letter to the archbishop or cardinal nominating a priest to work in the archdiocese. Today, such letters must also certify that a priest is fit for the ministry. The archbishop or cardinal then can decide whether to grant the priest permission to work in the diocese. But according to Sipe, the information was often missing from nomination letters, or communicated over the telephone to avoid a record.

Which brings me back to the documents released Wednesday. I think it will be very interesting to see whether those filed include the letters from the religious orders, and if so, just how much or how little did those religious orders reveal the Los Angeles archdiocese?

Stay tuned...