NEW HAMPSHIRE
The Union Leader
OUR RECENT series on the likely future of the Catholic Church in New Hampshire was sobering. Six years from now there may be as few as 70 active, fulltime priests here. That is down from today's 109.
Fewer priests will mean fewer services and pastoring to meet the needs of what is still the state's single largest religious denomination.
The Diocese of Manchester is wise to be planning for this crisis, but any real hope for success will come — and can only come — after the diocese deals with the crisis of confidence that already exists here.
It has existed ever since John McCormack became Bishop of Manchester. It will persist for as long as he remains in that office.
We hold no animosity toward the bishop. But his record in Massachusetts under the disgraced Cardinal Bernard Law is one that cannot simply be wished away. When evil men were hiding behind the Cross to repeatedly injure trusting juveniles, John McCormack was in positions to do something about it. Instead, he seems to have either looked the other way, ignoring the truth, or fallen asleep at the switch. And those are the BEST ways in which one can look at it objectively.