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Pokin around : Cardinal Law, Portrayed As Protector of Pedophile Priests, Once Worked Here

By Steve Pokin
Springfield News-Leader
November 30, 2015

http://www.news-leader.com/story/news/local/ozarks/2015/11/30/pokin-around-cardinal-law-portrayed-protector-pedophile-priests-once-worked-here/76457754/

Bishop Bernard Law, age 42, in 1973.

On Thanksgiving I went to the Moxie Cinema and watched "Spotlight," the best movie I've ever seen on journalism, including "All the President's Men."

The film, based on real events, has a strong local connection: Cardinal Bernard Francis Law, who is the villain.

The film chronicles the Boston Globe's Pulitzer-Prize winning coverage of how the Boston Diocese protected pedophile priests and moved them from parish to parish. The man behind these decisions was Law, who became a Cardinal while archbishop of the Boston Diocese, the third largest in the nation.

Before going to Boston, Law, now 84, was bishop of the Springfield-Cape Girardeau Diocese from October 1973 to January 1984.

As a result of the Globe's dogged reporting, Law became a sort of poster boy, representing how the Catholic Church initially covered up of the misdeeds of pedophile priests.

The movie captures the heart-breaking damage done to hundreds of childhood victims. The Globe published the first of some 600 stories in January 2002.

Law's tenure as bishop here in southern Missouri is not part of the movie.

But we do have a thick file of news clips on Law. In reading these old stories, I was struck by Law's commitment to social justice. He came to Springfield from Mississippi, where he was the editor of a weekly diocesan newspaper.

Cardinal Bernard Law is seen at a memorial Mass in 2010 in St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican. (Photo: USA Today photo)

In the early 1960s, he won national awards for his editorial stands on racial justice.

How does that happen? How does the same man take a stand at great personal risk on racial issues and later in life turn a blind eye to the sexual exploitation of children?

The Rev. Thomas E. Reidy, 75, probably knows Law as well as anyone in Springfield. Reidy was the diocesan chancellor during Law's 10 years here. He visited Law in Rome during the summer. They did not discuss the reasons why Law resigned in disgrace in Boston in 2003. After the resignation, Law quickly was reassigned to a cushy job in the Vatican. He currently lives in Rome and is now retired.

Reidy tells me he plans to see "Spotlight."

"Although I'm not so sure I really want to," he adds.

He finds it hard to believe that the man he knows could have failed to act to protect children in Boston.

Yet Reidy admits he has no personal knowledge of what happened in Boston and does not speak to Law about it.

"He was a man of prayer, a man who always would do everything he could to help people," Reidy says.

Reidy is still diocesan chancellor and currently serves as the administrator. Bishop James V. Johnston Jr. left the Springfield-Cape Girardeau Diocese this month to become bishop of the Kansas City-St. Joseph Diocese.

Reidy is pastor of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton church in Springfield and St. Francis of Assisi church in Nixa. He told me a story about Law.

Years ago, Reidy rushed to the hospital after a family in his parish was in a serious auto accident.

"I was unable to help them because they spoke Spanish and I did not," he says. "I could think of only one person who spoke Spanish."

That was Law, his bishop, who was born in Mexico.

Law arrived and comforted the family for several hours. He did not leave until 5 a.m..

"I just don't know enough about what happened in Boston — other than what I read in the newspapers," Reidy says. "But I don't think it is a black and white issue. I'm not sure I can say he turned a blind eye to pedophile priests. There were a lot of individual cases and I'm not sure anyone initially grasped how serious it was.

"So often, back then, priests were sent away for counseling and the church was told back then that they could be brought back into the ministry. I think it's only in recent times that we know that a pedophile cannot be helped and should not be returned to the ministry."

Law's mother once told the News-Leader that her only child announced he was going to be a priest at age 7. He set up a pretend altar in the home and often prayed there, she said.

In March of 1984, News-Leader religion writer Peggy Soric, who passed away last year, wrote that "many observers" believe Law might become the first American pope.

Far from it. He will forever be remembered for his part in a horrific scandal.

Is Bernard Law a good man or an evil man?

I'm reminded of a news story I read years ago in the Los Angeles Times. It was soon after the videotape surfaced of several police officers beating Rodney King, a black man who was on the ground defenseless. I was living in Southern California at the time. King was beaten in 1991.

The Los Angeles Times wrote short profiles of the several baton-wielding officers. Two eventually were convicted in federal court of violating King's civil rights. They were sent to prison.

Like many, I had watched the videotape and hated these cops. Just as I watched "Spotlight" and hated Bernard Law.

Yet one of these Los Angeles Police Department officers, according to the Times, had recently dropped to the ground to give mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to a black transvestite who appeared to be dying. The transvestite had chancres covering his mouth.

The officer did this when no one else dared to help. This was during the Age of AIDS, when almost all feared contracting what was then considered a fatal disease.

I believe no one is all good. Just as no one is all evil. Each of us is a vessel filled with both potions.

With that said — I recommend you see the movie. It depicts journalism at its finest.

These are the views of Steve Pokin, the News-Leader's columnist. Pokin has been at the paper 3? years and over the course of his career has covered just about everything — from courts and cops to features and fitness. He can be reached at 836-1253, spokin@gannett.com, on Twitter @stevepokinNL or by mail at 651 N. Boonville, Springfield, MO 65806.

Contact: spokin@news-leader.com

 

 

 

 

 




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