Trying to Avoid the TRUTH in Philadelphia
Just Won’t Work Anymore
On 21 January 21 the Philadelphia Grand Jury issued a Report on sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests. According to Clerical abuse campaigner Richard Sipe, it the clearest and most complete account of the pattern and practice of the Catholic Church in dealing with priests who abuse minors and their victims.
The noose is getting closer to episcopal necks as investigations get more objective and the pattern of abuse in the system is laid out. Children are still endangered precisely because cardinals know exactly what their vicars do and vicars do exactly what their boss wants.
The Philadelphia Grand Jury released what has been termed a “sordid” report on clergy sex abuse, some examples:
Fr. Charles Engelhardt, 64, an Oblate of St. Francis de Sales, is accused of orally sodomizing and molesting a 10-year-old altar boy in 1998 in the sacristy at St. Jerome Parish in Northeast Philadelphia.
Fr. Edward Avery, 68, an Archdiocesan priest who was defrocked in 2006, is charged with the same offenses against the same boy. And this boy’s sixth-grade teacher at St. Jerome School, 48-year-old Bernard Shero, is accused of orally and anally sodomizing the then-11-year-old in the back of the teacher’s car.
Fr. James Brennan, 47, an Archdiocesan priest, is accused of forcing his penis into the buttocks of a 14-year-old former parishioner when he was in the priest’s bed. At the time, the summer of 1996, Father Brennan was on leave from Cardinal O’Hara High School. In 1997, he was returned to active ministry and assigned to St. Jerome Parish.
Importantly, Monsignor William Lynn, former Vicar for clergy is charged with endangering the welfare of children by allowing priests to continue to work.
Bishops and cardinals use an elaborate system of denial to cover their tracks.
Chancery offices are filled with people who will take the “fall” for their boss.
Boss Rigali
There have been priests accused and convicted of child rape before, but what is very significant for the entire church in the U.S. is that the supervising priest in Philadelphia, Msgr. William Lynn, is indicted for the endangerment of children.
Monsignor Lynn’s boss, Cardinal Rigali was on the defense immediately once the report became public and he claimed, “there are no archdiocesan priests in ministry today who have an admitted or established allegation of sexual abuse of a minor against them.” This of course is very strange.