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  Top Catholic Priest Accused of Sexually Abusing His Own Sons

By Anna Schecter
ABC News
June 21, 2010

[with video]

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/top-vatican-priest-accused-sexually-abusing-sons/story?id=10968647

A prominent Catholic priest, praised by Pope John Paul II as "an efficacious guide to youth," Father Marcial Maciel, sexually abused not only young seminarians under his control but also abused his own children, according to a lawsuit filed today in Connecticut by a man who claims to be Maciel's son.

In an interview to be broadcast Monday evening on ABC News Nightline, the priest's son, Raul Gonzalez, 30, says he thought his father worked for the CIA or an international oil company, until he saw the priest's picture in a 1997 magazine article detailing allegations of sexual abuse.

"My mom said, 'Is that you?' and my dad said, 'No, it's not me' and my mom said, 'Yeah, it's you,'" recalled Gonzalez in the interview, conducted by Jason Berry, an investigative journalist who first reported on widespread sexual abuse by Maciel at the Legion of Christ and writes for the National Catholic Reporter.

The Legion of Christ has acknowledged that Father Maciel fathered at least one child as a priest.

 
 

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