Denver, Colo., May 1, 2019 / 04:50 am (CNA).- Last week, Bishop Richard Malone of Buffalo suspended three priests who were accused of engaging in inappropriate sexual conversations with diocesan seminarians.
While the move is likely to be praised by those who have called for Malone’s resignation, or urged him to demonstrate a commitment to addressing clerical sexual abuse, his priests might have another take on the decision. And the unfolding situation in the Diocese of Buffalo might be a harbinger of what’s to come in the aftermath of scandals that have roiled the U.S. Church for the past nine months.
On April 11, a group of priests in Malone’s diocese had a party at a parish rectory. They invited some seminarians. At least one of the priests was a seminary formator, a spiritual director for the seminarians in attendance.
The party got out of hand, according to the seminarians. They said that alcohol was consumed in excess, and that some priests, their formator among them, engaged them in lewd, blasphemous, and pornographic conversation.
The seminarians said there was a telephone conversation with a woman who, they were told, wanted to have sex with them, there was discussion about the sexual habits of one seminarian’s parents, there was conversation, seemingly homosexual in nature, about the genitals of one priest’s parishioner and the body types of their fellow seminarians.
The seminarians were disturbed, they had the good sense to write their superiors, and Malone acted. He announced that after an initial investigation, three priests had been removed from ministry, and would face ““disciplinary and corrective actions” including “psychological evaluations and possible treatment, retraining in sexual harassment policies, individual retreats,” and, depending on the results of those steps, the possibility of further action.
Malone’s decision came during a difficult time for his diocese. Since August, the bishop has faced accusations that he covered up for some priests accused of abuse, withheld names from a published list of those credibly accused, and permitted a priest to return to ministry who had faced repeated allegations of grooming behavior.
Malone says he’s not covered up abuse, that he’s committed to transparency, and that he’s learned
lessons from his mistakes.
In fact, on the same day as the rectory party, April 11, Malone issued a thorough apology for his failings, while defending many of his actions and inviting an organization of his critics to assist him in developing new policies and protocols.
But Malone has continued to face calls for his resignation. Some Catholics in his diocese say he has not done enough to tackle clerical sexual misconduct, and that the diocese can not move forward without new leadership.
The bishop has said he will not resign: that he will “repent and reform,” while helping his diocese to “rebuild itself and learn and grow from the sins of the past.”
Many in Buffalo are likely to see his swift action regarding the priests at the April 11 party as a sign of commitment to his promises of reform. Diocesan officials have said that the suspensions are an indication that policies and protocols established by Malone are working. And the action will likely draw praise from many of those rightly concerned with the influence of apparently lecherous priests on seminarians.
But at least one group might look more skeptically at the matter: Malone’s priests.
It will not have passed unnoticed by Buffalo’s presbyterate that the diocesan announcement does not indicate what specific canonical crime the accused priests are alleged to have committed. There has also been no indication that the priests were given the opportunity to defend themselves before action was taken against them.
In fact, at least two priests at the party told reporters that they had no opportunity to tell their sides of the story before Malone announced his decision.
Well beyond Buffalo, many priests will also note with alarm the apparently coercive use of psychological evaluations and treatment as a punishment, a praxis forbidden by canon law but explicitly noted as a “disciplinary” measure in this case.
Priests will also ask whether due process, a clear explanation of the charges against them, and protection of their reputations during a canonical proceeding were afforded to the priests suspended in Buffalo. Diocesan clerics, even those disgusted by the apparent behavior of the Buffalo priests, might find themselves wondering whether they should expect similar treatment if accusations are someday leveled against them.
While bishops face public pressure, as Malone does, to “get tough” on misconduct, canonists and clergy have warned already about the risk that the canonical rights of accused clerics might be soon tossed over the side of Peter’s Barque.
That concern will sound familiar to observers who remember the years following the clerical sexual abuse scandal of 2002, a period in which, by many accounts, the rights of priests were sometimes forfeit to the need of bishops to “crack down” on clerical sexual misconduct. It is commonly held among priests and experts that in that period priests were sometimes censured unjustly, without any real opportunity to defend themselves.
Some observers will suggest concerns of that kind are a waste of time: the quibbles of lawyers who are scandalously focused on the rights of obviously malfeasant priests, those corrupting innocent seminarians, rather than with the integrity of the Church’s mission.
That reaction is certainly understandable. But canon lawyers are likely to note that the Church’s canonical tradition is the source of most western understandings of the rule of law: understandings predicated on the idea that just societies depend on procedural justice for legitimacy, even in cases where accused parties seem very obviously guilty. The Church has known for centuries that without affording the apparatuses of justice to the guilty, the innocent will have very little chance of vindication.
Of course, that’s the issue that puts Malone in a tough spot. And he is not alone. Bishops in the United States do have to demonstrate, to the satisfaction of ordinary Catholics, that they will take seriously complaints of obvious clerical wrongdoing, especially complaints manifested by seminarians, in the aftermath of the scandal that began with Theodore McCarrick. But if they do not at the same time protect and respect the canonical rights afforded to clerics, they will likely lose whatever trust they have among their closest collaborators, their priests. Losing that trust will compound their problems.
There is another problem with enacting ad hoc disciplinary measures outside the established procedural norms of Church law: they tend to be short-lived. The aftermath of 2002 taught that lesson well. Some bishops, after the “Long Lent of 2002,” began responding to allegations of misconduct hastily, without sufficient regard for canonical processes. This assuaged Catholics, to some extent, but it fostered resentment and mistrust among priests. In response to that resentment, some bishops began to slip into old habits, out of the public eye, and grew more lax about clergy discipline, especially regarding the kinds of offenses, like the ones in Buffalo, which are not specifically enumerated in the Church’s penal law. That laxity might have allowed misconduct to begin festering anew.
In short, a knee-jerk approach to discipline usually creates a pendulum effect, with very little long-term benefit.
So what bishops might do, in light of those lessons, to address obvious occasions of clerical misconduct?
Some canonists have advocated for at least one possible solution in recent months: actual canonical legislation, at the diocesan level, that establishes a framework of specific delicts—canonical crimes—related to sexual misconduct, and a system of gradated penalties that correspond to them. In the present law of the Church, all but the most egregious sexual delicts are defined nebulously, and bishops usually have very little idea how to handle them.
But many canonists argue that bishops could make their own lives easier by using their legislative prerogatives to establish clear canonical processes to use when situations like the one in Buffalo emerge. They could, in short, create particular laws that enshrine their plans for addressing these matters, and they could ensure that they follow those laws when it becomes necessary. This would tell priests what to expect if they act imprudently or immorally, and it could ensure that their rights are protected.
By some accounts, the very knowledge that such law existed would boost morale among many priests, make seminarians and others more likely to report misconduct, ensure the protection of rights, and put bad actors on notice that misconduct once ignored could lead to real consequences.
At their June meeting, bishops will discuss national solutions to the sexual abuse crises the Church is facing. But bishops needn’t wait for that meeting to establish local solutions to problems they will likely face in months to come. Buffalo, and the situation of Bishop Malone, is a reminder that thoughtful proactivity will likely better ensure justice than will hasty reactions made when problems have already hit the press.
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The gutter-dwelling pathology of the “Catholic” Bishops Establishment is shown by their monstrously abusive employment of the Marxist tactic of incarcerating priests in “mental” hospitals: in the US, this means the anti-Christian abomination called “St. Luke’s Institute” in Silver Spring, MD.
This place is a monstrous fraud against the Catholic Church, promoting sodomy and other evil, a place where the abusive Cardinal Cupich threatened to illicitly imprison Father Kalcik of Chicago for standing against the mortal sin of sodomy. Here is the history of St. Luke’s, reported by Phillip Lawler at Catholic Culture in 25 April 2017:
1981 – Founded by Rev. Michael Peterson.
1987 – Rev. Peterson dies of AIDS.
1989 – Rev. Curtis Bryant, SJ hired as head of therapy.
1989 – Notorious homosexual predator Rev. John Geoghan undergoes his 1st week-long “evaluation” at St. Luke’s and is re-assigned to ministry.
1991 – Geoghan allegedly molests 1 or more boys in Cambridge, MA. (disclosed in report by Boston Globe in 2009).
1992 – Rev. Canice Connors, OFM becomes Director of St. Luke’s.
1995 – Notorious predator Rev. John Geoghan, undergoes 2nd week-long “evaluation” at St. Luke’s. upon which Rev. Connors wrote: “there are no specific recommendations concerning his spiritual life….”
1995-96 – Predator Geoghan alleged to have twice sexually abused a 10 yr old boy in Weymouth, MA (Boston Globe).
1996 – Rev. Bryant quietly “disappears” after his license to practice counseling became “inactive,” for reasons kept secret.
1997 – Investigative journalist Lesley Payne relays reports from a therapist disclosing Bryant’s “prancing peacock” behavior at St. Luke’s.
1997 – Rev. Connors leaves St. Luke’s, assumes job as President of Conference of Major Superiors of Men. Connors protests that the Dallas Charter from the USCCB is “scapegoating the abusers.”
1997 – Rev. Stephen Rossetti succeeds Connors as President of St. Luke’s. Rossetti protests to America Magazine that he is concerned that the sex abuse scandal might become “a witch hunt for gays” in the priesthood.
2002-04(?) – Rev. Candice O’Connor, President of St. Luke’s, comes under public criticism for repeatedly failing to properly assess predator Geoghan, and for not “reining in” the peacock Rev. Bryant.
2008 – Rev. Edward Arsenault named President and Director of St. Luke’s.
2013 – Rev. Arsenault resigns after allegations of theft of hospital funds and spending on his “gay lover.”
2014 – Arsenault convicted of felony for stealing $300,000 from A hospital, a local Bishop’s account and a deceased person’s estate.
Feb 2018 – Rev. Arsenault dismissed from priesthood.
Sep 2018 – Cardinal Blase Cupich attempts to incarcerate Father Paul Kalchik at St. Luke’s, for speaking out against sodomy at Resurrection Church in Chicago, and supporting parishioners who found and burned an LGBT banner formerly flown in the parish sanctuary by a previous gay pastor who died a notorious death in his rectory bedroom stocked with gay pornography.
I remind readers that Cardinal Cupich is hand-picked by McCarrick and Francis, and represents the anti-Christian beliefs and behavior expected of Bishops under the corrupt Bergoglian abuse and apostasy pontificate.
My goodness, everyone here is human, including priests and bishops. We are all sinners. I’m beginning to wonder if we’re not getting a little pompous when it comes to condemning the clergy. Let the process work, for heaven’s sake! Give it time.
That priests and seminarians would have a party on the Thursday of Passion Week says it all really.
RICO can’t come soon enough to many of our corrupt dioceses.
I hope the Feds and AG’s hammer them into prison. Enough BS.
I attended seminary in the 90s at a more conservative seminary, found out later that the faculty offered “rewards” for joining in their socializing and banter and more. A peer of mine went to a faculty member for help in a class, was pressured into sex, and then found he passed the class. When he became a priest, he found out that “everywhere” he went there was a network of priests with influence…if he gave them physically what they wanted, they took care of him with money, good assignments, overlooking any complaints about him, etc. THIS REALLY HAPPENS and most lay people and even many good priests are in complete denial in my experience. I did not know about this directly until after ordination because I was/am not gay and was fairly naive. But I did have a vocation director who propositioned seminarians and made it pretty clear that those who did his bidding got money, favors, promotion, etc.
The bishop in Buffalo can discipline these priests because they got exposed, but what people may not realize is that the future path of the seminarians who have blown the whistle is doomed…there will be subtle and not-so-subtle reprisals from all the priests who are inside the network of influence that put these men in charge of seminary formation to begin with.
My good friend from seminary was a young newly ordained priest – let’s call him “Fr. X” – when he went to confession to a respected older priest of his diocese. After confession, the priest propositioned Fr. X. Fr. X, shocked and angered, went to the bishop to report what happened, thinking that the bishop would also be outraged. The bishop reprimanded Fr. X for squealing, essentially saying that if this was between adults it was not his concern, he is not the babysitter for the priests. A short time later, a trumped up charge of misconduct was brought against Fr. X. He was taken out of ministry and told to go to Saint Luke’s (see above comment for its history). Fr. X found a canon lawyer to advise him, the canon lawyer told him to go to Saint Luke’s and cooperate with everything being asked of him. Fr. X was strung along by Saint Luke’s, had his stay extended, kept doing everything he was told to do because he sincerely wanted to return to ministry. Then at the end Saint Luke’s gave him a formal evaluation saying that Fr. X was not fit for ministry. THEN Fr. X found out that his canon lawyer had been close friends with his bishop in the seminary…the whole process was a set up! Now Fr. X has a negative evaluation and has been out of ministry for several years, writes his bishop and gets no reply, is living with a relative in isolation and has absolutely no recourse – all because he dared to report a homosexual predator of influence who clearly enjoys the bishop’s favor. THIS STUFF REALLY HAPPENS.
The laity are being taken for a ride by bishops who hope that the teeny tiny bit of information that has thus far leaked out will be all that gets out. Buffalo is your diocese too, wherever you may live. The problem is that laity don’t want to wrap their heads around how unfathomably filthy it really is. Your seminary and your diocesan structure very likely has the same sort of dynamic going on, even if the priests are more prudent and careful than these ones in Buffalo who had the party.
JD, please keep giving us a forum to talk about this. We need it desperately.