CALIFORNIA
Pasadena Star-News
[Archive of Los Angeles Archdiocesan Documents – BishopAccountability.org]
By Barbara Jones and Tracy Manzer, Staff Writerss
gvtribune.com
Posted: 01/26/2013
When the Most Rev. Roger Michael Mahony was tapped by Pope John Paul II to be the shepherd of Los Angeles’ 3 million Roman Catholics, a local priest called the choice “a breath of fresh air for the archdiocese.”
Within months of his installation as archbishop on Sept. 5, 1985, the North Hollywood native had advocated for immigration reform, encouraged interfaith communication and launched plans to expand spiritual and social programs for the region’s Hispanic Catholics. Mahony quickly became a fixture in Los Angeles as he ministered to the region’s disenfranchised residents and rubbed elbows with its civic leaders.
“We must realize that Christ came as the son of God not only to spend his time in the synagogue, but also to involve himself in the daily life of the people,” he said in an interview at the time.
“We as his disciples must realize the Gospel must speak to actual, current situations.”
For Mahony, those situations would include complaints that scores of his priests were abusing children — altar boys, students in parochial schools, sons and daughters of their parishioners.
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