MINNESOTA
Canonical Consultation
03/09/2015
Jennifer Haselberger
In November of 2013, the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis announced that it had hired Kinsale Management Consulting to conduct a review of all its clergy files as part of its ‘ongoing efforts’ to ‘address the issue of clergy misconduct’. According to news reports at the time, the review was to begin in December of 2013 and would include all clergy in active ministry. Later reports indicated that the review was expanded to include all clergy active after 1970.
Some of the results of this review were quick to become public, and would have been unsurprising to those familiar with Archdiocesan personnel files. Less than a month after the review began, Fathers Joseph Gallatin and Mark Wehmann were placed on leave from their parish assignments. Father Ken LaVan, accused of sexual abuse of minor girls in the 1980s but permitted to remain in active ministry even after the adoption of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People and after Archbishop Nienstedt had publicly declared in November of 2013 that no such priests remained in ministry, was finally removed and publicly named in February of 2014. In addition, as a result of the file review the Archdiocese’s list of priests with credible claims of sexual abuse of minors more than doubled from the 33 originally reported in court filings to include at least 69 priests, deacons, and religious. And, because of the file review and significant setbacks in court, the Archdiocese was forced to list additional cases of abuse that occurred or were reported after 2004, despite statements made in court by Archdiocesan attorneys claiming there was only one such case.
These were exactly the results that I was seeking when I called for an independent file review while I was employed at the Chancery and after my resignation. My colleagues and I were completely aware and informed of these situations, but I was never able to convince Archdiocesan leadership to take action to protect the faithful. Instead, my concerns were brushed aside. The file review, from my perspective, was directed towards forcing the Archdiocese into taking necessary actions that it had otherwise been unwilling to consider by bringing a fresh voice and perspective to the discussion.
Yet, while the Archdiocese has been fairly public with some of the results of the Kinsale file review (transparency, in the Archdiocesan lexicon, still seems to mean something different than it does to the rest of us), they have been largely quiet if not silent on the more unsettling results of Kinsale’s work. For, in addition to the publicly announced removals and leaves of absence, there have been a number of unpublicized ‘retirements’, ‘sabbaticals’, ‘transfers’,and other removals of priests from ministry that can be linked to the reevaluation of old accusations and/or concerns brought to light through the file review. In fact, according to multiple sources who have been involved in this process, the Kinsale review has resulted in nearly 250 clergy files being ‘flagged’ for issues of concern.
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