MILWAUKEE (WI)
Sun Herald
By M.L. JOHNSON — Associated Press
MILWAUKEE — Former Milwaukee Archbishop Timothy Dolan sought to push problem priests out of the priesthood to avoid further scandal after sex abuse victims began coming forward in the early 2000s.
Many victims in Milwaukee began coming forward in 2002 after news broke about clergy abuse in Boston.
Dolan wrote to then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict XVI, in July 2003 asking to dismiss Daniel Budzynski.
Abuse allegations against Budzynski stretched to the 1970s, and Dolan told Ratzinger in correspondence made public Monday that “as victims organize and become more public, the potential for true scandal is very real.”
The Vatican removed Budzynski from the priesthood in 2004.
Dolan’s letter is part documents the Milwaukee archdiocese released Monday. Dolan is currently the cardinal of the New York archdiocese.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.