By Rita Ciolli
Newsday
September 8, 2002

William Murphy hadn't even completed his first week as the bishop of Rockville Centre when, from the window of his fifth-floor office, he saw the second jet hit the World Trade Center.

Then, as he continued to preside at funeral masses for those killed, the pedophilia scandal rocking the Catholic Church reverberated across Long Island.

And in March, a priest was murdered on the altar of a Lynbrook church, as was an elderly parishioner in a front pew.

"It has been a difficult year for many reasons," Murphy said as he sat down next to the open window with its westerly view of lower Manhattan and reviewed his tumultuous first 12 months as head of the nation's sixth-largest diocese.

Dealing with these crises, he said, has delayed his agenda of building more ecumenical bridges among the area's different religious groups, addressing social issues such as affordable housing, preparing the diocese for its first synod in 2007, visiting all 134 parishes - he has 20 more to go - and even determining whether a few more need to be established in developing areas of Suffolk County.

"I haven't been able to move as quickly on everything as I would have liked to. But that's all right," he said. "That again is the Lord's will."

In his small, vintage Long Island office of paneled wood, built-in cabinets and vinyl chairs, Murphy defended his handling of sex abuse cases, praised the priests of the diocese and for the first time provided a glimpse into the finances of what is considered one of the wealthier dioceses in the nation.

"I believe I am a trustworthy bishop and I think that I have always acted in a way that deserves - merits - the trust of the people. That doesn't mean that I don't make mistakes," said Murphy as he clasped his hands and leaned forward in his chair.

Back in March, as the church scandal began spreading across the nation, Murphy said there were no credible allegations against priests in the diocese, but after published accounts from victims he suspended a number of priests. A month later, Suffolk District Attorney Thomas Spota announced a special grand jury probe to see if the church had covered up repeated cases of sexual abuse.

Murphy said he is cooperating "100 percent" with the sexual abuse investigations conducted by the local district attorneys and cited a recent letter by Nassau District Attorney Denis Dillon praising the diocese's cooperation. In the letter to diocesan attorney George Rice, Dillon concluded that there was no basis to prosecute the "diocese itself or its administrators" for the way sexual misconduct cases were handled.

The investigation in Suffolk potentially poses more of a problem for the diocese. Murphy said he is "very eager to hear whatever the Suffolk County grand jury decides and we will see where that goes from there." Spota declined to comment on the work of the grand jury, whose term expires in November.

Murphy wouldn't discuss how specific cases were handled, but said that "anyone who looked at the record would have to say that from the very beginning I acted honestly, openly and responsively."

The Rev. Tom Goodhue, executive director of the Long Island Council of Churches, said Murphy has to be "shell shocked" by the sexual abuse scandal. "He is sort of getting it from both sides," said Goodhue, describing the unpopularity of Murphy's decision to suspend one or two well-liked priests who may have made a mistake a long time ago, while at the same trying to placate a laity furious that it has taken so long for the diocese to weed out pedophiles. "There has been a huge amount of anger that he has had to deal with from people in the pews," Goodhue said.

So far, that anger has not affected the collection plate. "My priests tell me that their Sunday collections, which are the major things, are holding steady," Murphy said. While this year's Bishop's Appeal, a once-a-year collection that supports diocese programs, Catholic Charities as well as the parishes, matched last year's $13.6 million, but is still $750,000 short of the $15-million goal Murphy set for 2002. "We are not through the year yet, I think we are in pretty good shape," he said.

During the interview, Murphy referred fondly to his many years spent in Rome and displayed his extensive knowledge of the city and of the church's early involvement in helping the poor and providing social services. While at first a little of unsure of what life in the suburbs would be like, Murphy says now, "I love Long Island, I am so happy here, I can't tell you."

Murphy came to Long Island from Boston, where he was born and raised and rose through the ranks of the church. For most of the 1990s he was the vicar general and close confidant of Cardinal Bernard Law, the cleric at the epicenter of the priest sex abuse scandal. After months of being on the defensive against accusations that the leadership of the church covered up the problem of pedophile priests, Murphy appeared weary and over-tasked. "You'll have plenty of time to rest in eternity," he said.

During the interview, Murphy repeatedly sought to reassure Long Island's 1.5 million Catholics that none of their donations are being used to pay for the costs of the abuse cases. Instead, he said any money given to victims came from a separate fund the late Bishop John McGann set up for emergencies. In contrast, settlement payments and litigation costs have forced the Boston Archdiocese to cut its budget by 40 percent, while in Los Angeles, there was a 20-percent trim.

"We are able to handle things in such a way that no money that is given for the Bishop's Appeal or to a parish is used," he said. "It all goes to the purpose for which it is given."

While the contributions are "holding their own," Murphy said he didn't know whether Rockville Centre, as it is often said, really is among the nation's wealthiest dioceses. "I have to tell you that we can use every dime we can get," he said.

The bishop said that when he arrived last September, he was presented with an operating budget that would have put the diocese in the red. "I said, gentlemen, you are going to learn something about me today. I don't operate with a deficit budget, you can rework it and bring me back a balanced budget."

The diocese has about 400 priests who marry about 6,000 couples and baptize about 22,000 infants every year. It operates five hospitals, four high schools and 59 elementary schools, according to the U.S. Catholic Directory.

Last month, he again told department heads to cut their proposed budgets for the fiscal year that began Sept. 1. To hold down costs, Murphy put a freeze on new jobs and cut plans to update the diocese's information systems. Murphy said that all major financial decisions, including the sale of church property, must be reviewed by a board of lay advisers. The bishop has recently changed the makeup of the five-member panel but has declined to release their names. Diocesan spokeswoman Joanne Novarro, however, described the board as "Catholic, influential businessmen," and said the bishop plans to expand it to include women with financial expertise. The board also would decide whether to make public the diocese's financial statement.

Murphy said he has spent so much time dealing with the abuse issue, involving a few priests, that he hasn't had time to get to know all those who have been doing good work while having "borne the heat of the day." Also this summer, Murphy spent weeks traveling, including a trip to Nigeria, where he invited 12 nuns from a Benedictine contemplative order to come to Long Island to pray for vocations.

So in July, Murphy wrote to his priests apologizing for not getting to know them personally. The bishop said that once the renovation of his new quarters in the old convent at St. Agnes Cathedral is completed, he will have enough space for as many as a dozen priests at a time to come for dinner.

To quell a small controversy that had arisen over the cost of the new quarters, Murphy said the diocese would sell the current bishop's residence, a home near the cathedral that had been donated to the diocese years ago by the sisters of Walter Kellenberg, the first bishop of Rockville Centre.

Murphy said priests have the support of their parishioners who know them. Still, he said, it has been a difficult time. "As one priest said to me, 'I stand there and look out and I say, how many of these people think I'm guilty?'"

As head of the nation's only exclusively suburban diocese, Murphy said he was pleased to find it more complicated and with more ethnic and racial groups than he expected. "I had been here once, really. I performed the wedding for my best friend in Westhampton Beach back in the early '70s, so I thought Long Island was Westhampton," he said. "This is not a homogenized place, it is richly diverse and that is great for all of us."

However, he is still baffled by the multilayered government structure of towns and villages as well as the numerous school districts, a lesson he learned when he asked his advisers why the Roosevelt district didn't have the same financial resources as some of the more affluent ones nearby.

"The political structure here is very complicated and it has some very real social consequences. Now, I am not prepared to go further than that because I still have not figured it out."

When Murphy thinks about what happened this past year, he remembers a conversation he had with Pope John Paul II when he worked for him in Rome 20 years ago. "Don't ever forget that there are no coincidences," the pope told him. "It's all in God's providence and in God's design."

Deeply disturbing to Murphy was the gunning down in March of Rev. Lawrence Penzes and Eileen Tosner, 73, a parishioner attending Mass at Our Lady of Peace church. Murphy said he prays for the victims and for Peter Troy, who is accused of the crime. "I pray for him all the time."

Even if the events of the past year were meant to happen, Murphy said the sex scandal has changed him. "Believe me when I tell you I truly feel heartbroken, I am so angry over this that it has changed me. I dealt with this in Boston, it is heartbreaking."

As he tries to set his own agenda in his second year, Murphy will still be dealing with the legacy of the last. The morning of his interview he was told that the last of the checks from $3 million in donations for local victims of Sept. 11 was handed out, but that a continuing effort is necessary to meet the emotional needs stemming from the attacks, especially those of children.

"The trauma is great ...," Murphy said. "I think moments like this are moments that the Lord asks us to live through as an opportunity for us to really be tested to see how open we are to God's design in life. And if I can help people to see the hand of the Lord even in the midst of tragedy, then I think that is a good thing."

GRAPHIC: Newsday Photos/Alejandra Villa - 1) Bishop William Murphy saw the second jet hit the Twin Towers from his office. Dealing with the aftermath of 9/11 was only one of many challenges he faced, delaying his own agenda. 2) "It has been a difficult year for many reasons," Murphy says. 3) Newsday Photo/Karen Wiles Stabile - Bishop William Murphy administers communion during the funeral Mass in March for Rev. Lawrence Penzes, who had been killed during a church service earlier that week. 4) Newsday Cover Photo/Alejandra Villa - Bishop William Murphy.