BOSTON (MA)
Boston Catholic Insider
On August 18, The Economist published an article entitled, “The Catholic Church in America: Earthly concerns” which somewhat accurately portrays the financial state of many dioceses in the U.S. but which also made some inaccurate statements or implications about Boston. A number of readers have asked us to comment on this, and today we take a few moments to belatedly do so.
This excerpt gives the gist of the article:
The sexual-abuse scandals of the past 20 years have brought shame to the church around the world. In America they have also brought financial strains…The church’s finances look poorly co-ordinated considering (or perhaps because of) their complexity. The management of money is often sloppy. And some parts of the church have indulged in ungainly financial contortions in some cases—it is alleged—both to divert funds away from uses intended by donors and to frustrate creditors with legitimate claims, including its own nuns and priests. The dioceses that have filed for bankruptcy may not be typical of the church as a whole. But given the overall lack of openness there is no way of knowing to what extent they are outliers. Thousands of claims for damages following sexual-abuse cases, which typically cost the church over $1m per victim, according to lawyers involved, have led to a liquidity crisis.
That much is accurate. But later, the article said the following:
Some dioceses have, in effect, raided priests’ pension funds to cover settlements and other losses. The church regularly collects money in the name of priests’ retirement. But in the dioceses that have gone bust lawyers and judges confirm that those funds are commingled with other investments, which makes them easily diverted to other uses. Under Cardinal Bernard Law, the archdiocese of Boston contributed nothing to its clergy retirement fund between 1986 and 2002, despite receiving an estimated $70m-90m in Easter and Christmas offerings that many parishioners believed would benefit retired priests.
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.