Worcester bishop says he told priest to seek help

By Stephen Kurkjian
Boston Globe
December 17, 1992

Globe correspondent Gerard F. Russell contributed to this report

The bishop of the Worcester Catholic Diocese said yesterday that he had ordered a priest who is now accused of sexually molesting two youths in New Mexico to leave the diocese in the late 1960s and seek treatment for "psychological problems."

Rev. Bernard J. Flanagan, who is now retired, recalled that as bishop in the late 1960s, he had directed that Rev. David A. Holley be sent to a Catholic center in Baltimore for treatment.

"The best I can recall is that he was suffering from psychological problems, emotional things," Father Flanagan said in a telephone interview. "I don't remember what it was that caused us to send him, but it had to be very serious to take a step like that."

Father Holley, now 65, was accused in a civil suit filed in Albuquerque yesterday of sexually abusing two youths in New Mexico in the early 1970s. Ordained as a priest in the Worcester Diocese in 1958, Father Holley served as a priest in central Massachusetts dioceses for approximately a decade before he was ordered to seek psychological treatment.

The Worcester Diocese was also named in the lawsuit and charged with negligence for allegedly allowing Father Holley to serve in New Mexico parishes even though it knew he was being treated as a pedophile. Also sued was the Order of the Paraclete, a Catholic order, which runs the treatment center in Jemez Springs, N.M., to which Father Holley was sent by the Worcester Diocese.

The diocese yesterday declined to say why Father Holley had been referred for treatment to either Baltimore or New Mexico facilities or whether he had been found to have molested any youths in the Worcester parishes.

In a prepared statement, Msgr. Edmond T. Tinsley, head of the diocese's financial affairs and human services, said that Father Holley was a priest in Worcester between 1962 and 1969. Although the diocese has not seen copies of the lawsuit, Tinsley said that the report in yesterday's Globe of "allegations of his abuse of minor children . . .is most disturbing to us. We are concerned deeply if anyone has been hurt."

Msgr. Tinsley said that the diocese had ordered Father Holley, who is now retired and living in Denver, to seek medical evaluation.

Father Holley has not been available for comment.

Bruce Pasternack of Albuquerque, lawyer for the two men who filed the suit in New Mexico, said he has been in contact with four other men who allege that they also were molested by Father Holley. However, he said, the four others are unsure if they will join the lawsuit because they are unwilling to have their identities known.