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	"Fresh Questions" about Future Pope's Handling of Abuse Case, "Nyt" Says By Mark Memmott NPR March 26, 2010 http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2010/03/fresh_questions_about_future_p.html "The future Pope Benedict XVI was kept more closely apprised of a sexual abuse case in Germany than previous church statements have suggested," The New York Times reports this morning, "raising fresh questions about his handling of a scandal unfolding under his direct supervision before he rose to the top of the church's hierarchy." According to the Times, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (now the pope) "was copied on a memo that informed him that a priest, whom he had approved sending to therapy in 1980 to overcome pedophilia, would be returned to pastoral work within days of beginning psychiatric treatment. The priest was later convicted of molesting boys in another parish." Previously, the church had said a deputy to Ratzinger had made the decision to return the priest to his duties. Church officials question whether the memo actually made it to Ratzinger's desk. This is the second consecutive day the Times has broken news about how the pope handled reports of sex abuse involving priests when he was a lower-ranking church official. Yesterday, the newspaper reported that "top Vatican officials -- including the future Pope Benedict XVI -- did not defrock a (Wisconsin) priest who molested as many as 200 deaf boys, even though several American bishops repeatedly warned them that failure to act on the matter could embarrass the church, according to church files newly unearthed as part of a lawsuit." The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel says today that: "The Vatican on Thursday defended its decision not to defrock a Wisconsin priest accused of sexually assaulting as many as 200 deaf boys from the 1950s to the 1970s and denounced what it called a 'despicable' attempt to smear Pope Benedict XVI and his aides. "But Wisconsin advocates for victims of clergy sex abuse suggested the Vatican's handling of the case involving Father Lawrence Murphy -- and revelations on similar cases in Europe - provide evidence of an institutional coverup that spanned decades and continents."
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