Chris Lang: Is Vatican Doing Enough to Punish Clergy in Sex-abuse Scandals?

Morning Call
September 22, 2015

http://www.mcall.com/opinion/mc-pope-francis-priests-sex-abuse-lang-yv-0923-20150922-story.html

A worker hangs banners last week along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia before Pope Francis' visit to the city this weekend. (Matt Rourke / AP)

Pope Francis' visit to Philadelphia is being billed as a "World Meeting of Families." The motto reads: "Love is our Mission: The Family Fully Alive."

While the pope has admirably denounced economic inequality and made strides on certain social issues, scandals in the Catholic Church continue to raise skepticism about its self-proclaimed role as protector of the family.

The Morning Call recently reported that an advocacy group for clergy sex-abuse victims, the Catholic Whistleblowers, wants Pope Francis to investigate the child protection records of Cardinal Justin Rigali, former archbishop of Philadelphia, and Cardinal Raymond Burke, who led dioceses in Wisconsin and Missouri.

I admire the group's efforts, but I'm not sure how much we can expect from the Church's leaders.

Just last year, Francis whisked away Papal Nuncio Jozef Wesolowski from the Dominican Republic, when it was discovered the nuncio had been luring young boys into his beach house to engage in sex for money. Critics believe this directly contradicted the Church's stance of reporting pedophile priests to secular criminal justice systems. The Church invoked diplomatic immunity and secretly recalled him to Rome without informing local authorities.

In a New York Times piece, Antonio Medina Calcano, dean of the faculty of law and political science of the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo, argued: "From the pure standpoint of justice, [Wesolowski] should be tried in the country where the acts took place because the conditions for trying him will not be the same elsewhere." (The nuncio passed away in August. He was under house arrest in the Vatican awaiting trial by Vatican authorities.)

Details about the nuncio's actions are disheartening, as impoverished boys as young as 14 were offered increasing amounts of money for sex acts. One boy, who normally earned just $1.50 a day, said he was given $10 to shine the nuncio's shoes and swim naked in the ocean. He was later paid $25. Then $135. Over time, he received gifts like new sneakers. And a new watch.

Wesolowski was apparently not alone when carrying out some of these acts.

Another Polish priest, the Rev. Wojciech Gil, recently pleaded guilty in March to charges of possession of child pornography in hopes of receiving the lightest penalty — seven years — for his crime. Prosecutors pushed further, however, claiming he molested boys at the same beach house as Wesolowski, with the nuncio participating.

Francis in April accepted the resignation of Kansas City-St. Joseph Bishop Robert W. Finn, who became the most senior U.S. Roman Catholic prelate convicted of criminal charges related to sexual abuse when he failed to report a priest who took pornographic pictures of young girls three years ago.

Some complained Finn should have resigned much sooner. In a story in the Kansas City Star, Rebecca Randles, an attorney who filed dozens of lawsuits involving sex abuse allegations against the diocese, said, "Bishop Finn came to symbolize the elevation of a privileged clergy over the safety of children."

Two other bishops, Archbishop John C. Nienstedt and Bishop Lee A. Piche, resigned in June in Minneapolis, after being found they willfully ignored signs of a pedophile priest.

Nienstedt came under fire from his former chancellor for canonical affairs, Jennifer Haselberger, for using a chaotic system of record keeping that concealed the backgrounds of guilty priests who remained on assignment.

Nienstedt initially refused to resign, claiming in another New York Times piece that while he had never knowingly covered up sexual abuse by clergy members, he had become "too trusting of our internal process and not as hands-on as I could have been in matters of priest misconduct."

Go figure.

All of these cases remind us that the Catholic Church continues to fail when it comes to the reporting of child abuse to the proper authorities.

Part of the World Meeting of Families includes a separate Festival of Families on Saturday. According to the WorldMeeting.org website, this will be "an international celebration of family, community, and faith. Everyone is invited to join in this joyful, global celebration of support and love."

Famed singer Andrea Bocelli will perform, along with the Philadelphia Orchestra.

I'm sure it will be a grand show.

Chris Lang of Bethlehem writes about contemporary issues.