UNITED STATES
Spiritual Politics

Mark Silk |Jul 13, 2012

Imagine an alternate universe where the Catholic Church behaved the way the trustees of the Pennsylvania State University have when confronted with evidence of the cover-up of sexual abuse of minors by the leadership of one of its important institutions.

Let’s call that institution the archdiocese of Boston, headed by one Cardinal Bernard Law. And let’s say a newspaper, the Boston Globe, published an investigative series showing a disgraceful pattern of covering up sexual abuse of minors by a large array of priests.

Faced with the evidence, what does the Vatican do? It turns to a distinguished law enforcement official–say, a former head of the FBI–to conduct an independent investigation. The result? To paraphrase yesterday’s report on the Penn State affair:

The most saddening finding by the Special Investigative Counsel is the total and consistent disregard by the most senior…