ROME
Huffington Post
[the letter]
By Philip Pullella
ROME, May 22 (Reuters) – The leader of the Legionaries of Christ admitted on Tuesday he knew for years the scandal-plagued religious order’s most famous priest had fathered a child but still allowed the popular cleric to preach about morality.
The religious order, still reeling from revelations that its founder was a sexual abuser and drug addict with two secret families, suffered another major blow last week when it admitted that Father Thomas Williams, an American based in Rome, had also led a double life.
But the question that had been left hanging after the first admission was how long Williams’ superiors knew.
In a letter to members published on the order’s website, Father Alvaro Corcuera said he found out about Williams’s child “early in my new assignment” as the order’s director-general, which began in 2005.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.