RICO in Robes 0
The child abuse scandal in the Catholic Church is in the news again. This time, the statute of limitations has not expired and there have been arrests, including the arrest of a church official in charge of overseeing priests for endangering children.
I tend to avoid discussing this; I’ve known enough good, dedicated priests, priests who work hard to do right and to do the right things that I do not wish to see them wounded more than they already have been by the actions of their management.
For it has ultimately a management problem. Weakness amongst clergy of all religions and persuasions is not uncommon. The crime was the cover-up.
In this situation, the cover-up was truly worse than the crimes, for the cover-up protected abusers so that they could continue to abuse.
Nevertheless, in the face of this, in which an honest man is punished for honesty, . . .
(snip)
On Friday, though, the college issued a statement accusing him not only of being gay, which it called contrary to traditional Catholic doctrine, but also of misrepresenting before he was hired that he was a member of an independent branch of Catholicism.
He denied both accusations Saturday, saying he never hid his sexuality or his affiliation with the Old Catholic Apostolic Church of the Americas from school officials.
The college recruited him, not the other way around, he said. In a meeting with officials, he recalled asking: “You know I’m not a Roman Catholic priest, right?“
. . . it is difficult to think that the American Catholic Church–the management, not the persons on the ground trying to do right–has become little more than RICO in robes.
Afterthought:
Ronnie Polaneczky addressed the firing of the professor, Father Jim St. George, in her column yesterday.
