Father Gana Stayed in Church Because He Also Womanized and Stole Parish Money: So, Not a “pure Pedophile”

JD Journal
May 25, 2012

http://www.jdjournal.com/2012/05/25/father-gana-stayed-in-church-because-he-also-womanized-and-stole-parish-money-so-not-a-pure-pedophile/


On Thursday, Monsignor William Lynn of the Philadelphia Archdiocese was ripped apart by the prosecution and a gem, a true scintillating gem of Church logic came to fore. The reply given by Monsignor Lynn to the unhappy being identified in court records only as “Tim” was cited by the prosecutors. Tim, a former seminarian, had been repeatedly sexually abused by Reverend Stanley Gana, and a scathing 2005 grand jury report was cited on the exchange where Tim faced Monsignor Lynn. Tim asked why, even though the entire church knew that Stanley Gana was a confirmed pedophile, he was not evicted from the church.

The grand jury report says, “Monsignor Lynn asked the victim, who had been forced to have oral and anal sex beginning when he was 13 years old to understand that the archdiocese would have taken steps to remove Father Gana from the priesthood had he been diagnosed as a pedophile.”

“But Father Gana was not only having sex with children and teenage minors, Monsignor Lynn explained, he had also slept with women, abused alcohol and stolen money from parish churches,” informed the report of the grand jury.

The rationale: “That is why he remained, with Cardinal Bevilacqua’s blessing, a priest in active ministry. ‘You see, Tim,’” said Monsignor Lynn, ‘he’s not a pure pedophile.’”

Monsignor William Lynn is accused of covering up priestly abuses of young children and shielding pedophiles, and such priests were sent from parish to parish to hunt fresh flocks of victims.

The grand jury report further continues, “Father Stanley Gana, ordained in the 1970s, sexually abused countless boys in a succession of Philadelphia Archdiocese parishes.

“He was known to kiss, fondle, anally sodomize and impose oral sex on his victims. He took advantage of altar boys, their trusting families and vulnerable teenagers with emotional problems … He molested boys on a farm, in vacation houses, in the church rectory. Some minors he abused for years.”

But, as held by Monsignor Lynn, the Church could not punish and evict Gana as a pedophile because he also did it with women, and also abused alcohol, and also stole parish money. Such further acts, in the eyes of the Church absolved Gana from being a pure pedophile.