December 17, 2002
Join a Letter-Writing Campaign Demanding Episcopal Accountability!
Please feel free to forward this message to anyone
(individual, group, listserve, whatever) you think might be interested. Let's
get some letters moving to the right people.
One has to hope that Cardinal Law's stepping down from Boston
is only the first of a number of episcopal resignations. If much is expected
of the flock, even more is expected of the shepherd.
Just as priests who abused children have been or are being
removed from ministry and many defrocked, so must the bishops be sanctioned
who aided and abetted abuse by transferring such priests and continuing
them in ministries where they had contact with children.
From Boston alone, there are a host of such bishops
now serving in other dioceses. The National
Catholic Reporter writes: "Some who have followed the ongoing church scandal closely say the
release of the 2,200 pages [of Boston Archdiocesan priests' records] is
especially damaging to the credibility of Law and some of his former archdiocesan
officials who have since been promoted to head dioceses of their own:
Archbishops Alfred C. Hughes of New Orleans; and Thomas Daily of Brooklyn,
N.Y.; and Bishops Robert Banks of Green Bay, Wis.; John McCormack of Manchester,
N.H.; and William Murphy of Rockville Centre, N.Y. Said David Clohessy,
national chair of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests: "If
anyone had the notion that this was just about Cardinal Law, that notion
is dispelled. Clearly, Banks, Daily and McCormack and others were deeply
and recently involved."
McCormack has problems in Manchester too, where he has made an agreement
with New Hampshire's Attorney General acknowledging that "the State has
evidence likely to sustain a criminal conviction against the Diocese for a
failure in its duty to care for young people." The unthinkable sight
of a churchman in good standing being convicted of criminally protecting child
abusers is likely in the near future.
American Catholics should now insist that all the
bishops who facilitated continued abusive behavior by serial offenders
must resign and that the Vatican accept those resignations. Other
ecclesiastical sanctions should be decided on a case-by-case basis.
Catholics should write their bishop demanding episcopal
accountability as the next necessary phase in resolving the clergy sex
abuse scandal. The following letter may provide a basis for such a letter.
Your bishop's address may be found by checking http://www.usccb.org/state.htm.
Letters to bishops may also be copied to:
Bishop Wilton D Gregory, President
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
3211 4th Street, N.E., Washington, DC 20017
Archbishop Gabriel Montalvo
Apostolic Pro-Nuncio to the USA
3339 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20008
Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, Prefect
Congregation for Bishops
10 Piazza Pio XII
00193 Vatican City State, Europe
TEXT OF SAMPLE LETTER
Dear Bishop :
The US Catholic bishops have formulated and committed themselves to principles
for the handling of cases of child sexual abuse by clergy. However, while
American Catholics have been disgusted by the abuse itself, we have been
equally disgusted by the past failures of many bishops. They showed no
compassion for child victims of sexual abuse. They protected abusive priests
by maintaining secrecy about their crimes and transferring them to new
positions where they could still abuse children.
Cardinal Law has duly suffered removal from his position
as Archbishop of Boston for his awful conduct in this matter. American
Catholics look upon this as only the beginning of the second phase of the sexual abuse crisis: the
removal of all bishops
who are guilty of the same sort of conduct. If priests who committed the
abuse must be removed from ministry, so too must any of their superiors
who facilitated their continuing such conduct.
I urge you and other US bishops to pressure your
guilty brothers to resign. The American bishops
should urge the Vatican to accept all such resignations. When a guilty
bishop will not resign voluntarily, the Vatican should remove him. Either
the bishops or the Vatican should create tribunals to deal with further
sanctions in individual cases, such as the removing of honorific titles
like cardinal and bishop, restricting ministry, and possibly even laicization
where the scandal has been particularly harmful.
Finally, American Catholics are no longer content
to have bishops who refuse to be accountable to them. Both the priests
and the lay people of a diocese should have an effective voice in the
selection, five-year review, and, when necessary, sanctioning of their
ordinary. Only accountability to their people can change the current episcopal
culture of secrecy and arbitrary and autocratic action that harms the
people of the God.
Yours in Christ,
*** This ACTION ALERT E-MAIL is from the Women's Ordination
Conference. Send comments or information for future ACTION ALERTS to Joy Barnes,
WOC Program Director at grassroots@womensordination.org.
For more information about WOC and how to become a WOC member, visit www.womensordination.org.
***
