UNITED STATES
WGBH
[with audio]
By PHILLIP MARTIN
Pope Francis arrives in the United States next week and will be traveling to DC, New York and Philadelphia. Boston, the nation’s 4th largest archdiocese, is not part of the Pope’s agenda on this trip. No doubt such a visit would have resurrected still unresolved issues connected to the Sex Abuse Scandal. But this week the issue came to the surface with the publication of a new investigative report tracing some accused clergy to parishes outside the U.S.
What happens to Catholic clergy accused of sexually molesting children? Some have been successfully sued. A handful have been convicted. And some of them have ended up presiding over parishes throughout Latin America.
“We’re talking about cases where there were big investigations, big stories, front page news, TV news about these men and where a few weeks later they were allowed to transfer from the United States to South America and immediately go back to working for the church.”
That is the finding of an exhaustive yearlong investigation by Globalpost.com, published days before Pope Francis is scheduled to arrive in the United States. Will Carless is a correspondent for the Boston-based news organization. We spoke with him from his home in Rio de Janeiro.
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