Leslie Hittner: Church should be ashamed of cover-up

By Leslie Hittner
Winona Daily News
March 30, 2014

http://www.winonadailynews.com/news/opinion/columnists/local/leslie-hittner-church-should-be-ashamed-of-cover-up/article_5f4dc9ae-1188-5f17-9086-81cf9b1c98e1.html

Leslie Hittner

Since the First Sunday of Advent, 2013, there have been at least 10 stories in the Winona Daily News about the Diocese of Winona’s involvement in the Catholic Church cover-up of priestly sexual abuse. Indeed, the Church’s “shepherds” seemed to have been shepherding teams of lawyers who graze in courtrooms instead of “the flock.”

Ten stories about the Diocese of Winona and the cover-up.

Zero stories about the Diocese of Winona and the season of Advent.

When I was working for my brother, who owned and operated our family’s trucking business, he used to say, “Watch what a business advertises. That will be an area where it is weak. That will be what it does not do right. That will be an area where that business struggles.” That’s why nearly every forced release of information about the priestly sexual abuse cover-up is accompanied by official statements that review the policies and procedures that the church has set in place “to protect the children.”

It’s not because the church does these things that such statements are released. It’s because the church didn’t do these things.

Remember also, that throughout all of this, few if any bishops have been held accountable by the church. The church continues to deflect the public’s attention about its sexual abuse issues by pointing to sexual abuse and sexual abuse cover-ups elsewhere — as if that makes some sort of a difference.

Well, gentlemen, it doesn’t.

In a story in the Winona Daily News published Dec. 17, Bishop Quinn said, “For me, this is a very, very sad morning.” He was referring to the forced disclosure of 14 priests who were credibly accused of sexual abuse.

Why was he sad?

Was he sad because the Diocese was involved in a massive cover-up of priestly sexual abuse?

Was he sad because the courts forced the diocese to finally release the names of those 14 priests and he had to ‘fess up?

The bishop then went on to talk about what the Diocese was doing now — and he completely ignored what the diocese was doing then, and which continues to be covered up.

And that, dear readers, is the subject of the entire series of lawsuits.

During every effort to disclose the inappropriate activities of the Catholic hierarchy, the church has been oppositional — but they always “cooperate.” While the courts continue to uncover past behaviors that appear to be illegal, the church continues to fail to hold bishops and cardinals accountable.

Attempts to depose the archbishop of the metro have met with particularly strong opposition.

Why?

Is it because the archbishop of the metro might eventually be forced to “plead the fifth” — and make it obvious that the church’s cover-up of these activities is simply illegal?

One has to wonder.

The great wagons of the church have been formed into a circle over this issue for years. But only the members of the hierarchy are inside the circle. The rest of us are on the outside — left to read the advertising signs on the sides of the wagons.

And we all know what those signs say.