Sex Abuse
Crisis Pressure mounts for Laws resignation
By CHUCK COLBERT
Boston
On March 19, the day officials of the Boston archdiocese turned
over four boxes of files detailing more information about allegations of
clerical sexual misconduct to Massachusetts Attorney General Tom Reilly,
leaders in the local business community began to withdraw support from Cardinal
Bernard Law, some even calling for his resignation.
Writing on the op-ed pages of The Boston Globe, for
example, David F. DAlessandro, chairman and CEO of John Hancock Financial
Services, said, The church cant heal with Law at the helm.
The Catholic father of three boys, DAlessandro went on to say,
Bringing this crisis to an end requires a new beginning. It demands a
pastor and teacher and father against whom there is no doubt, no reservation or
concern. The cardinal would like to fill that role. But wrongly or not, the
doubt and reservation and concern exist, and they make it more difficult for
the church and its parishioners to reconcile.
While acknowledging the many good and important things the
cardinal has done over the years, DAlessandro wrote that a new
leader is the only one way for the archdiocese to put this scandal behind
it and regain its rightful role as a force for good within our
community.
On the other side of town, the Boston Heralds
publisher, Patrick J. Purcell, authorized an editorial titled, Its
time for Law to make his exit. The editorial said, It is the scale
of the tragedy and the long-practiced deceit of victims and families that has
made it impossible for the cardinal to lead the archdiocese.
Consequently, the editorial concludes. It pains us to say
it, but after such a failure of leadership -- closing his eyes to so many
transgressions of the vows, engaging in so much deceit, failing to adopt
preventative programs as neighboring Fall River [Mass.] diocese did -- Cardinal
Law simply is in no position to expect anyone to accept his authority on moral
issues.
A news story in The Boston Globe reported that Purcell, a
Catholic, was furious over the cardinals handling of the serial
pedophile priest John Geoghan, whom Law transferred to Purcells parish,
St. Julias of Weston, despite knowing that Geoghan had molested children
at other parishes.
There at St. Julias the Globe reported that Geoghan
presided over the wedding of Purcells daughter. Also, Purcells wife
was a teacher in the parishs religious education program, which Geoghan
supervised, according to the Globe.
Last month another Catholic who once advised Law, Paul La Camera,
the president and general manager of WCVB-TV, called on the Law to consider
resigning because he had lost his moral authority.
A member of the Irish Catholic business establishment and one of
the cardinals closest advisers, Jack Connors, founder and executive
director of Hill Holiday Connors Cosmopulos advertising agency, has backed off
from his initial support of the cardinal.
I gave him my thoughts, and there wasnt any reason to
continue after having done so, Connors told Globe reporters.
My recommendation to the cardinal was to get everything out, dont
hold anything back, there is no reason to have secrets, and be totally
forthcoming. You can be the judge of whether he has or hasnt done
that, he added.
But Law has retained public support among other high-profile
business leaders, including Peter Lynch, former mutual fund manager and
chairman of Fidelity Management. Lynch has not wavered in his $10
million pledge to the current $300 million fund-raising campaign, extended for
six more months due to the scandal, according to The New York Times. Law
has said that no money from that campaign will go to pay for settlements
against diocesan priests.
Law also enjoys the support of Latino and Vietnamese Catholics.
Both of those communities have prayed for him inside the Cathedral of the Holy
Cross in Bostons South End, and Latino Catholics rallied and prayed
outside Laws residence in the citys Brighton neighborhood.
Laws detractors, meanwhile, have kept up their protest vigil
outside the cathedral every Sunday when the cardinal presides at the 11 a.m.
Mass. Small groups of church reform advocates who want Law to resign have
announced details of a Good Friday prayer of solidarity vigil outside the
cathedral March 29 at 2:30 p.m. Organizers say it will take more than 500
people to surround the cathedral. They intend to manifest support and pray for
victims of sexual abuse and others who are suffering and for the
resurrection of a church that hears the voices of all its people,
according to the group, a coalition of concerned Catholics, and its promotional
literature (goodfridayevent@yahoo.com).
Meanwhile, both the Times and the Herald ran news
stories disclosing that the church may need to seek loans and gifts, as well as
to sell some of its prime real estate, including perhaps the mansion where Law
resides and St. Johns Seminary, both located near the Boston College
campus.
In other news, the Globe reported that Law has decided to
move his major spring fundraiser, The Cardinals Garden Party,
from his Lake Street residence to another location. Citing the discomfort
of Bostons Catholic elite, the Globe reported that the
archdiocese has been forced to move its glitziest annual
fundraiser.
Across the Charles River in Cambridge, prominent Catholics drew
several hundred people March 19 to a panel discussion and open forum on the
crisis. The event was sponsored by and held at the John F. Kennedy School of
Government at Harvard University.
Participants included Kennedy School public policy professor Mary
Jo Bane, who has called for Law to resign. She advocated a greater voice
strategy for the laity. Its my church, and I am not going to
be driven out by the bad action of the hierarchy, and or be driven out by a
refusal to discuss all the issues facing us, she said.
On the other hand, former Boston mayor and ambassador to the
Vatican Ray Flynn expressed concern about reform advocates motives.
I think there is a hidden agenda for a more dramatic change on some of
these issues, he said, such as abortion and same-sex marriage.
Chuck Colbert writes from Cambridge, Mass.
National Catholic Reporter, March 29,
2002
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