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'I don't think it's enough.' Local Catholics react to list of priests accused of sexual abuse
By Corinne S Kennedy
[with video] The first Sunday after church officials in Riverside and San Bernardino counties published a list of priests accused of sexually abusing children, Catholics across the Coachella Valley attended Mass and heard from their spiritual leaders about the church’s response to the abuse and how the faith community should move forward. At Sacred Heart Church in Palm Desert, Monsignor Howard Lincoln told churchgoers that one of the priests credibly accused of sexual abuse, Peter McCormick, had served at the desert parish. Lincoln said the Diocese of San Bernardino, which consists of the two counties, had published the names of the priests — and what action was taken after the accusations — to be more “open,” “honest” and transparent. He said Bishop Gerald Richard Barnes wanted to encourage anyone who had been abused by a priest to alert authorities. “It is our hope, that for people who experienced this, even in another state, even 50 years ago, if you are still suffering, please come forward,” Lincoln said. After an afternoon Mass, parishioner Margaret Westly said she thought publishing the list was a good step and added she was glad the list also detailed if action was taken and whether law enforcement was alerted. Westly said that although making the list public was positive, it was “a thankless task.” “They’re never going to please everyone,” she said of officials from Sacred Heart and the diocese. “I think they’re doing everything they can. It’s just a bad situation for everyone.” Westly also said she felt bad for priests who had not abused children or covered up the crimes of abusers. “There are good priests, so many good priests. And they’re being blamed,” she said. Leanne Cooper said everyone involved in the abuse cases, including the priests who committed the offences and anyone who covered their actions up, had to be brought to justice. “What happened was horrible. It’s a start, but I don’t think it’s enough,” she said of publishing the list. “It has been a lot of pain and suffering for these young men.” Outside Sacred Heart, Bonnie Terry said the church needed to set an example for the rest of the world and the priests who abused children had to confess to their crimes and be sent to prison. She said she hoped people who had been abused could also try to forgive their abusers. Terry also called for more transparency and said the cover-up of sexual abuse cases could rise to the level of the pope himself, and she said if that was the case that information had to be made public. McCormick, the priest who served at Sacred Heart and has been accused of sexual abuse, was a member or a religious order for priests who engage in sexual abuse and other “deviant” behavior when he was assigned to the Palm Desert church in 1984 — a fact diocese officials knew at the time. He has since admitted to engaging in sexual acts with a juvenile while he served at the desert parish. “As we would do with any religious order priest who sought to minister in the diocese, we look at the individual priest to see if they are fit for ministry here, on a case-by-case basis. When Fr. McCormick came to the Diocese in 1984, it was determined that he was fit to minister here,” Diocese of San Bernardino spokesman John Andrews previously told The Desert Sun. Diocesan records show he began sexually abusing a 13-year-old boy at a church near Los Angeles in 1990 and continued until the victim was an adult. He remained at Sacred Heart until 2000, when the allegations against him were made. Diocesan leaders contacted law enforcement two years later. Multiple other priests who served at parishes in the Coachella Valley and Riverside County have been credibly accused of child sex abuse, according to the San Bernardino and San Diego dioceses. Riverside and San Bernardino counties were formerly part of the Diocese of San Diego. A list released by the Diocese of San Bernardino last week included 34 church officials, of whom 14 are deceased. Five were permanently banned from the priesthood and 14 were permanently banned from ministry in the Diocese of San Bernardino. The list was based on diocesan records dating back to 1978, when the diocese split with San Diego to become its own jurisdiction. That list included McCormick as well as Roberto Barco, who was a priest at St. Louis Catholic Church in Cathedral City from 2011 to 2014. The diocese reported there had been credible abuse allegations against him from incidents occurring in 2009 and 2010. He was reported to the police in April 2016, the same day the diocese was made aware of the incidents. At the time, he was serving as a priest in Los Angeles. He was removed from that post the following month and has since returned to his native Argentina. The accusations against McCormick, Barco and others were deemed credible by a seven-member Diocesan Review Board, which includes church clergy representatives as well as representatives from law enforcement and legal and medical professions. The Diocese of San Bernardino has urged anyone who has been abused or knows someone who has been abused to report the incident or incidents to the Diocesan hotline at 888-206-9090 or the Office of Child & Youth Protection at 909-475-5125. Contact: Corinne.Kennedy@DesertSun.com
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