Posted on 03/25/2010 7:00:24 AM PDT by marshmallow
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - The Vatican did not discipline a Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing up to 200 deaf boys in the United States from the 1950s to the 1970s as Church laws do not require automatic punishment, its spokesman said on Thursday.
The New York Times reported on Thursday that the Vatican did not defrock Rev. Lawrence Murphy in the late 1990s despite receiving clear warnings from his bishops that his case was serious and could embarrass the Church.
The report came amid mounting allegations of sexual abuse by priests in Europe and pressure on bishops, mostly in Ireland, to resign for failing to report cases to civil authorities.
Among 25 internal Church documents the Times posted on its website was a 1996 letter about Murphy to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, then the Vatican's top doctrinal official and now Pope Benedict, showing he was informed of his case.
Ratzinger's deputy first advised a secret disciplinary trial but later reversed that in 1998 after Murphy appealed directly to Ratzinger for clemency. The priest died later that year.
Vatican spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi said in a statement that Murphy had broken the law but a civil probe into complaints against him in the mid-1970s had been dropped and the Vatican only learned of the allegations 20 years later.
"The canonical (Church law) question presented to the Congregation was unrelated to any potential civil or criminal proceedings against Father Murphy," Lombardi said.
"In such cases, the Code of Canon Law does not envision automatic penalties."
EXTENSIVE PAPER TRAIL
The 1996 letter to Ratzinger from the then Milwaukee Archbishop Rembert Weakland was not answered, the Times said.
After eight months, Weakland wrote a second letter to Ratzinger's deputy at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), .....................
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
OH, I paint everyone involved with this sickness with the same brush. The difference is- I EXPECT more from the Pope, morally.
Corrupt, lazy, inept, unconcerned cops and lawyers are no big surprise.The higher the moral authority one claims, the more is expected in the fight between good and evil.
Selected prosecution re. RAPING children!?! That’s bad?
Damned right I’m for selectively prosecuting such people right up to the grave, and reviling them after they’re rotting .At least the still living Nazis have the sense to hide- guilty priests are still pretending to be innocent and respectable.
Excuse it all you want, Ratzinger’s name is all over this!
But any attempt to point out his involvement or bring visibility to any abuse or cover-up by the Catholic church is considered slander and agenda driven.
I never cease to be amazed at the lengths people will go to protect pedophiles!
That’s news to me ... and I remember those years well.
You refuse to see the facts that people have pointed to you, and have already prejudged the matter.
And Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was supposed to believe Waekland?
Evidently, these non-Catholics have not heard of Waekland or the wreckovation he engineered while a Bishop.
“The Pope’s crime: failing to respond to two letters from Weakland 20 years after the events.”
No, it sounds like the Pope’s failure was failing to take these charges seriously.
Here is a scenario for you: a Baptist deacon is told the pastor sexually abused several young children during a Bible Camp. The deacon spends months deciding if he should discuss the matter with anyone else, and if it is serious enough to require investigation.
In the end, he talks to the pastor, who, in Rev Lombardi’s phrasing, agrees to restrict his public ministry and accepts full responsibility for the gravity of his acts. The Baptist pastor moves on to another congregation and spends the rest of his life interacting with young children.
Would you defend the Baptists for their non-handling of that scenario? I wouldn’t!
Also, from the BBC article: “The Rev Peter Hullermann had been accused of abusing boys in the 1970s when the now Pope approved his 1980 transfer to Munich to receive psychological treatment for paedophilia. Hullermann was convicted in 1986 of abusing a youth, but stayed within the Church, serving as a village priest until 2008.”
If he needed treatment for paedophilia, he needed severe church discipline as well - NOT secret counseling, and NOT remaining a priest for 22 years after a criminal conviction!
Sorry, but the Pope & the Catholic Church have dropped the ball on this. They don’t seem to think these cases are serious...just a “Priests will be Priests” attitude.
It is appalling.
VIGILANTE JUSTICE JUST AS BAD
Here is a link to an article about Murphy from the site Bishop Accountability. I can not help but notice the accusations came about because of recovered memories by the chief accusers/victims. Though the article does mention one person saying he did report the abuse when it happened.
http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news2006/03_04/2006_03_27_Zahn_StaringAbuse.htm
“In 2001, Pope John Paul II placed this department in charge of the investigation of child rape and torture by Catholic priests. In May of that year, Ratzinger issued a confidential letter to every bishop. In it, he reminded them of the extreme gravity of a certain crime. But that crime was the reporting of the rape and torture. The accusations, intoned Ratzinger, were only treatable within the church’s own exclusive jurisdiction. Any sharing of the evidence with legal authorities or the press was utterly forbidden. Charges were to be investigated “in the most secretive way ... restrained by a perpetual silence ... and everyone ... is to observe the strictest secret which is commonly regarded as a secret of the Holy Office … under the penalty of excommunication.”...Nobody has yet been excommunicated for the rape and torture of children, but exposing the offense could get you into serious trouble.”
http://www.slate.com/id/2247861/
Church Renovation ("Wreckovation")
(now retired)
marshmallow,
I am not anti-Catholic. I have friends and family that are Catholic and I truly appreciate and honor the church’s unyielding fight to protect the unborn.
Not all priests, bishops, cardinals or pope’s are molesters.
That said, I have entirely too much integrity to see this as an agenda driven attack on the church. The facts are repulsive whether they come from the most liberal or conservative news outlets.
The abuse is systemic and unfortunately for the church, the current sitting Pope appears to be part of the problem.
You seem to be really afraid that pedophile priests will pay for their evil- civilly and religiously.
How is exposing and prosecuting them ‘vigilante justice’?
Vigilante’s go door to door as a mob and leave bodies in the street.
Accountability and justice under civil and Church law is not vigilantism.
First it was the psychologists fault
Then it was the local Bishop’s fault
Now it is the fault of Wreckovation
I’m shocked that Bush or Obama haven’t been blamed!
The real story is that the Catholic-haters on this forum have not only jumped the shark, they have come crashing down in the water face first.
1) They show no evidence of having read the story.
2) They show no evidence of understanding what little they have read.
3) They show every evidence of uncritically accepting the insinuations, prevarications, and distortions spoon-fed to them by the leftist press.
They are a disgrace to this forum, and to whatever religious tradition/community/confession they represent.
I'm not excusing anyone.
You're the one who's excusing the police and the DA (who did nothing) and the local bishops (who did nothing) so you can point at a Pope who got two letters about it 22 years (or more) after the fact.
Are you amazed at the "lengths" the police went to to protect this particular pedophile?
“Here’s a little thought experiment on practical ethics. Suppose that you are having a drink with a new acquaintance and the subject of law-breaking comes up. “Ever been in any trouble with the authorities?”
You may perhaps mention your arrest at a demonstration, your smuggling of excess duty-free goods, that brush with the narcotics people, that unwise attempt at insider trading. Your counterpart may show a closer acquaintance with the criminal justice system. He once did a bit of time for forgery, or for robbery with a touch of violence, or for a domestic dispute that got a bit out of hand. You are still perhaps ready to have lunch next Friday. But what if he says: “Well, I once knew a couple who trusted me as their baby sitter. Two little boys they had—one of 12 and one of 10. A good bit of fun I had with those kids when nobody was looking. Told them it was our secret. I was sorry when it all ended.” I hope I don’t seem too judgmental if I say that at this point the lunch is canceled or indefinitely postponed.”
http://www.slate.com/id/2248557?obref=obinsite
I suspect the police’s actions were driven by the implied lack of attention to the issue by the clergy.
I excuse nobody, but you obviously do.
Are you so blinded by your faith that you cannot wrap your head around the fact that the Pope did not act to protect children who were being raped?
Think about it.
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