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  A Bad Choice, Cardinal Rigali

By John Grogan
Philadelphia Inquirer [Philadelphia PA]
April 19, 2005

Dear Cardinal Rigali,

How can I put this delicately?

Last week, you blew it.

As the highly visible head of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, you had the opportunity to stand tall in support of the thousands of children who suffered sexual abuse at the hands of Catholic priests. You had the chance to silently protest the actions of a church hierarchy that for too long protected abusers.

Before the world, you could have boycotted your colleague who epitomizes everything the Catholic Church did so terribly wrong in handling the long-running molestation tragedy.

And what did you do? Nothing.

Your chance to make a powerful statement came April 11 when Cardinal Bernard Law, a central figure in the American sex-abuse scandal, was chosen to say a Mass in memory of Pope John Paul II. A disgraced Law was forced to resign as archbishop of Boston in 2002 after it was revealed that he had secretly shuffled pedophile priests among parishes.

You could have made your statement without uttering a single word, simply by not showing up.

That is what your 10 fellow American cardinals did. They didn't appear for Law's service. Even as they diplomatically dodged saying why they were absent, the message was unmistakable.

A lone holdout

And then there was you, the only American cardinal to stand beside this man and lend him your good name and credibility.

With all due respect, your eminence, what were you thinking?

Were you thinking you might hurt Law's feelings by snubbing him? That you should be a team player? That it's time to let bygones be bygones?

Here's what it looked like to lay Catholics desperate for clarity on this deeply disturbing scandal:

It looked as though you were afraid to make waves. It looked as though you lacked the moral courage to take a stand, even a quiet stand, even on an issue as unambiguous as this. It looked as though you valued loyalty to a brother in red above loyalty to what is right.

It looked bad.

Last year you stated: "With profound sorrow, I offer deep apologies to the victims of sexual abuse by any cleric or church employee. I assure everyone of the Archdiocese's commitment of steadfast perseverance to ensure compassionate concern to those who have suffered as well as a safe environment for all our children."

I want to believe in your compassionate concern, Cardinal. The vast majority of Catholics do.

But your walk does not support your talk.

Willful deception

What Law did was unconscionable. It was arguably even worse than what the pedophile priests themselves did. They at least could argue they were captives of sick impulses.

But Law willfully and craftily chose damage control over child protection, keeping known molesters one step ahead of police and public scandal. In burying the shameful secrets, how many more children did he expose to unspeakable vileness beneath the cloak of God?

It does not take tremendous bravery to stand up against such repugnant duplicity. And yet you could not even give your flock that much, the fortitude of simply not showing up.

Your absence from Law's Mass would have spoken volumes. Your presence there spoke volumes, too.

Where is your moral outrage?

Before you dismiss me as just another Catholic-basher, please know I spent my childhood in the company of priests. I was an altar boy, and I worked at the church rectory answering phones. My two uncles were priests, and in the summer they would bring their clergy friends to our house on a lake to swim. Through all of the daily contact, there was never a whiff of impropriety.

I know firsthand most priests are pure. They, too, deserved more from you.

By inviting Law to celebrate a high-profile requiem Mass, the Vatican showed just how clueless it is to the pain American Catholics are suffering.

Law's presence on the altar was a hot iron in the still-raw wounds of the nearly 11,000 American victims of Catholic clergy abuse.

By standing beside him, Cardinal Rigali, you provided the salt.