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Burlington Roman Catholic Diocese Bishop Christopher Coyne says he will cooperate fully in new investigation of priest abuse at former orphanage.
By Nicole Higgins Desmet
[with video] The Diocese of Burlington will cooperate fully with a joint state-local investigation into possible criminality stemming from the stories of abuse told by former residents of St. Joseph's Orphanage, Bishop Christopher Coyne said Sunday morning. Coynetold parishioners during Mass at St. Joseph's Cathedral, and then reporters at a rare press conference, that the church erred in the past with its legalistic approach to allegations of abuse by clergy. Both survivors and the faithful deserve a more compassionate response, he said. "As someone who loves the church, I’m filled with shame and sorrow," said the bishop, who was appointed to his position in 2014, not only of the abuse allegations in Burlington, but of what he called "scandals" from all across the country, most recently in Pennsylvania. "The only way we can get to the truth of these matters is to be cooperative," Coyne said. 'Ghosts of the Orphanage' are heard once againA lengthy BuzzFeed News article, "The Ghosts of the Orphanage," published Aug. 27 brought back into the public eye survivors' stories of physical abuse and cruelty by nuns and clergy at the orphanage, which closed in 1974. In two-decade-old court depositions and in interviews, former orphanage residents have detailed beatings, children locked away in attics and even the death of a boy thrown from a fourth-floor orphanage window. In the 1990s, the Burlington Free Press revealed many of those stories and followed the survivors' quest for justice in federal and state civil courts, where they were largely not successful. On Friday, Vermont Attorney General T.J. Donovan, Burlington Police Chief Brandon del Pozo and Mayor Miro Weinberger indicated a joint task force is being created to review what occurred at St. Joseph's all those years ago. Donovan said Friday he'd not been aware of what occurred at St. Joseph's, which operated on North Avenue and later became diocesan headquarters and for some years was home to the now-failed Burlington College. "I've driven by that place thousands of times," said Donovan, a native Burlingtonian. "I went to Burlington High School a couple hundred yards away. This was a well-kept secret. I think we can say unequivocally that abuse occurred there." This will be the first known criminal investigation into the acts allegedly committed by Burlington diocese officials at the orphanage. Many orphanage records sent to order of nuns in MontrealThe bishop pledged Sunday the diocese would turn over any documents investigators request. Coyne said some records related to St. Joseph's Orphanage are not in the diocese's possession, however, and would be in the hands of the Sisters of Providence in Montreal. The order of nuns ran the orphanage from the late 1800s until 1974. The bishop said he'll be calling the Sisters of Providence to tell them of the looming investigation in Vermont. What the diocese does possess are records of every orphan who spent time at St. Joseph's, he said. "I don’t know where this is going to go," he said. "I just trust in God we’ll find the truth as much as possible." Prosecutors and Burlington authorities plan a 10 a.m. Monday news conference about the scope of their probe. It is not clear if it will focus exclusively on the orphanage survivors' stories or revisit instances of clergy abuse around the state. The Vermont Attorney General's Office investigated instances of sexual abuse by priests at local parishes beginning about 15 years ago. According to Bishop Coyne, the Diocese of Burlington provided every document it could find related to allegations of abuse of a person by a priest. Investigations stemming from those efforts led to some prosecutions of priests who had served in Vermont. The diocese will open its files to see if it missed anything from the first information request, Coyne said. Orphanage survivors came forward years before 'Spotlight' investigation in BostonCoyne spoke about the experiences of orphanage abuse survivors, with whom the diocese settled out of court 20 years ago, and of survivor's of Roman Catholic abusers in general. "The believability of the allegations was a lot less" at that time, Coyne said Sunday. The survivors first came forward close to a decade before the Boston Globe "Spotlight" investigation in 2002 unveiled not only the extent of sexual abuse by clergy but the scope of the Catholic Church's efforts to cover up those acts. Coyne said he was a spokesman for the Archdiocese of Boston through some of those years. "One of the largest mistakes we made was we let the lawyers drive the bus,” he told reporters Sunday at St. Joseph Cathedral. "Lawyers do what lawyers do, which is they try and protect their client." “But that was not the pastoral thing to do,” he said. "The only way, the best way, to respond is as a pastor." Coyne said that he learned from victims in Boston that they want to be heard and believed, because for years they weren't believed. "Now when someone comes I say to them, 'I believe you. I want to hear you. I'm not going to just dismiss you,'" Coyne said to reporters, with the hope that any survivors reading his message in the media will know they can approach him After Coyne spoke to his congregation about the investigation and his willingness to listen, an older man in the pews wiped his eyes and bowed his head. The woman next to him reached for his hand. St. Joseph's Orphanage abuse: 'It just cried out for attention' From 'this is news to us' to bishop's statementsThe bishop's decision to speak publicly to parishioners and reporters came about quickly. When asked about the looming investigation on Friday, Diocese of Burlington spokeswoman Ellen Kane said, "This is news to us." Before 10 a.m. Mass the bishop in green vestments greeted parishioners inside the cathedral, most of them senior citizens with a sprinkling of working-age adults. New Americans clustered together in bright Sunday clothes in the back pews. A parent guided one child up the steps. Coyne said he chose to address the new investigation on Sunday, ahead of an executive committee meeting of the U.S. Catholic Bishops organization this week in Washington, D.C., which had been previously scheduled. He mentioned the meetings in a recent blog post concerning the larger issue of clerical abuse. "New revelations of scandalous and even criminal activity ... have deeply angered and shaken all of us," Coyne wrote in the post. He appeared to be referring to the Pennsylvania grand jury report that found 1,000 persons had been abused by a total of 300 priests over many decades. Coyne met in the last few weeks members of the Vermont clergy and laypersons to find a way forward to restore trust among the 120,000 Vermonters who identify as Roman Catholic. About 27,000 of those Catholics attend Mass regularly, he said. Among the findings of those conversations: "People want change. They want bishops to be just as accountable as priests are," Coyne said. Bishop Coyne's sermonThe bishop recited a gospel story in which Jesus Christ performs a miracle and then tells people not to tell anyone else. At the news conference, the bishop was asked about the possibility of implications in that story that might ring out to survivors of abuse as "don't tell." "That was certainly a possibility, I knew we were going to talk about this after communion," Coyne said of the allegations. "So I felt that it was better for me to speak to the people words of faith rather than the scandal." Coyne said he had addressed the allegations in sermons given in previous weeks. And he spoke of the need for a cultural change within the church, exemplified by his openness for a press conference. Reflective of the challenges the bishop faces, Coyne made a joke during Mass leading up to the closing agricultural metaphor in his sermon. He said in the story that he asked a walking companion, a fellow bishop based in Fairbanks, Alaska: “What did you do to have somebody send you to Fairbanks?” A few parishioners chuckled. "It’s a bad choice of words to use," Coyne acknowledged. "It’s a turn of humor amongst us." He conceded he "should be more careful." Contact: ndesmet@freepressmedia.com
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