MILWAUKEE (WI)
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Milwaukee Archbishop Jerome Listecki warned Catholic parishioners to “prepare to be shocked” by revelations in a trove of documents released Monday related to the church’s sex abuse scandal.
He was right. The details in thousands of pages of depositions, personnel files and letters are profoundly disturbing.
Equally disturbing is something else the documents reveal: a pattern of willful neglect stretching across decades within church hierarchy.
Church officials moved accused priests from one parish to another, often accompanied by cordial letters; they failed time after time to notify authorities; they maintained what even bishops describe in depositions as a culture of silence; they paid priests to leave the priesthood; and they moved money, apparently, to protect it from the claims of victims.
Even now, we wonder if the hierarchy really gets it: In his letter last week, Listecki wrote that “the arc of understanding sexual abuse of a minor” had evolved over the years. Really? Does he mean that church officials once did not consider abuse of a child to be criminal activity that needed to be dealt with directly and firmly? That sounds like an excuse, though Listecki probably did not mean for it to be.
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