ROME
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests
The following twelve papal candidates are the ones that we are most worried about becoming the next pope. These twelve were chosen based exclusively on their actions and/or public comments about child sex abuse and cover up in the church. Sources include mainstream media accounts, legal filings and victims’ experiences. The names are in no particular order.
1) Cardinal Norberto Rivera Carrera, Mexico
–He blamed the media for “attacks on the church,” alleging “over-reporting” of church sex cases.
–He claimed that there are no “documented” cases of abuse against minors in Mexico.
–He also repeatedly minimized and concealed multiple child sex abuse allegations against Fr. Nicholas Aguilar Rivera who traveled between his native Mexico and the Los Angeles archdiocese, molesting kids in both places. Aguilar Rivera’s current whereabouts are unknown.
2) Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga, Honduras
–He said much of the U.S. media was anti-Catholic and that the major networks and newspapers “made themselves protagonists of what I do not hesitate to define as a persecution of the church.”
–He also opposes bishops turning allegations of clerical sexual abuse over to civil authorities for investigation and possible prosecution. “I would be willing to go to jail before harming one of my priests — I am not a policeman,” he said.
3) Cardinal Timothy Dolan, New York
–In August of 2011, Dolan took minimal steps against Fr. Jamie Duenas, who repeatedly abused a teenage girl who worked for him and was arrested. Instead of helping the police or the victim, Dolan attacked the victim on his official website for going back to work after the first assault.
–That same year, Dolan kept silent for nine months about the case of Brother Lawrence Gordon, an assistant principal who had child porn on his computer. Such delays and secrecy give predators ample time to potentially destroy evidence, intimidate victims, discredit witnesses, threaten whistleblowers, and fabricate alibis.
–Internal church documents released by a judge last summer show that Dolan devised a secret plan to pay pedophile priests $20,000 each to quietly leave the ministry. Some of the clerics went elsewhere, but Dolan warned no one. At least 12 priests are known to have gotten payouts.
–In 2007, Dolan publicly and vehemently denied paying off offender priests after it was discovered that one notorious priest child sex offender, Fr Franklyn Becker, was given money.
[NY1]
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