Following his courtroom victories, the priest wanted to chronicle his long ordeal, not just as a way to share his devastating story but also to impart the lessons he learned about healing and recovering from the public attacks he endured. "I learned that healing is not just about clearing your name or proving your innocence. It is about reclaiming your identity, rediscovering your purpose, and allowing the trials you've endured to shape you into someone stronger and more compassionate." In addition to a personal retelling of his adversity, the priest shares how a therapeutic approach and its emphasis on meaning-making can lead to recovery from trauma, such as that suffered from public defamation.
The Archdiocese Independent Review Board discussed publicizing the names of credibly accused clergy members but decided against it because doing so would “stir up controversy.” The IRB publishes only a “positive” list of priests authorized to perform ministerial duties on behalf of the archdiocese, but that list includes clergy members like one priest, with multiple accusations of assaulting minors, as long as those allegations are either pending or the board has deemed them “not sustained. The archbishop, at an IRB meeting, acknowledged the existence of internal lists the archdiocese kept of clergy with sustained accusations of child sexual abuse as determined by the IRB.
While the nature of the priesthood was established by Jesus Christ himself and is unchanging, human hands have built a bureaucratic, inward-focused, reform-defying edifice that must be changed. To this day, there’s very little transparency, both at the diocesan levels and in the Vatican. Yet as the saying goes, sunshine is the best disinfectant, including when matters of morality are at stake. The best way to provide that sunshine is to allow even greater involvement from lay Catholics — i.e., non-priests — in identifying, investigating and responding to allegations of impropriety within the Church - such oversight is needed not only in matters of sexual abuse of minors, but also in finance.
The archbishop writes that while it’s of “paramount importance” to take every allegation of misconduct seriously, the archdiocese must also restore the good name of an accused person when claims are not substantiated. “To that end, I publicly affirm that Father is a priest in good standing and express sincere appreciation for his many years of service to the People of God and the Archdiocese,” he adds. “He deserves our respect and gratitude and I hope you will join me in thanking him for his long-standing dedication.”
The conference said that “disciplinary measures were imposed” against the Cardinal after “verifying the truthfulness of the facts” concerning allegations of sexual abuse against the cardinal. The Cardinal denied that the imposition of the precept meant the allegations against him had been proven. “The decree issued by the [then] Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith… mentions there is a fumus delicti, meaning there is a possible suspicion [of a crime] that has not been proven, because it had not been subject to a trial that provides me with the due right to defense,” the Cardinal wrote. “As I said before, and I say again, I accepted the restrictions imposed against me reservedly in the precept for the good of the Church, leaving a written record that these accusations against me were false, waiting for the occasion to be able to defend myself, something that has not happened.”
That clerical corruption has endured from biblical times until today is not a surprise. Clerics hold power. The theological reality of apostolic succession has the ancillary consequence of granting bishops enormous power in the Church, and sometimes in the world. Lord Acton wrote in the 19th century that power tends to corrupt, but that was already evident to Ezekiel (who excoriates the wicked shepherds [bishops] of Israel). This is the perennial temptation in the Church, and the reason that the Church is semper reformanda, always in need of reform. The Temple needed to be cleansed in the time of Caiaphas. It still does. It always will.
It was the perfect storm: Father's parish served an impoverished community desperate for any financial lifeline, the allegations were recent rather than historic. In 2006 he was removed and later pled guilty to groping allegations against him in return for the recommended five-year sentence. Thus, for the past 20 years, dozens and dozens of accusers have come forward and filed lawsuits or made claims with the Archdiocese, and each progressive iteration of such claims have become more absurd, more implausible, and very obviously fraudulent. (The Attorney General's web site reports some 130 accusers.) But the media knew what it was doing all along. It was a poorly kept secret in the local media for many years that the cases were almost entirely fraudulent, yet they published their stories anyway without question.