BOSTON (MA)
The Republican - MassLive [Springfield MA]
July 18, 2023
Even after two decades of clergy sexual abuse horror stories, it’s hard not to be affected by what Skip Shea says he experienced as a teen, after landing a job mowing lawns at a retreat center for priests.
It was called the House of Affirmation – a place whose name promised emotional support and healing for troubled priests, including pedophiles.
Two years ago, Shea told investigators from the state attorney general’s office that starting in 1974, at the age of 14, he was given alcohol by priests at the House of Affirmation – and sexually abused at least eight times over a few years. The facility was only a year old.
Today, Shea wants to know whether the public will ever learn what the attorney general’s office discovered, as it pursued what’s believed to have been a wide-ranging inquiry into how Catholic dioceses in Springfield, Fall River and Worcester handled the clergy abuse crisis. The AG’s investigation is known to have included interviews with abuse survivors in Berkshire County; other organizations, including SNAP and Bishop Accountability, have confirmed they were aware of the AG’s probe.
Shea recently shared his frustrations with reporter Nancy Eve Cohen of New England Public Media.
It’s possible that the state’s former attorney general, Maura T. Healey, handed off the investigation to her successor when Healey became governor. Neither Healey’s office nor the current attorney general, Andrea Campbell, would comment for Cohen’s story.
Like Shea, we’d like to see what Healey’s investigators learned. We accept that prosecutors don’t always get the goods when probing an issue. But in the case of clergy sexual abuse, the public deserves to know whether a review by the AG’s office found patterns of institutional behavior – even short of criminal actions – that deserve to see the light of day.
Spokespeople for the Springfield and Worcester dioceses told NEPM they are reporting allegations of clergy abuse to law enforcement officials, as is required.
The House of Affirmation was shut down in 1990, according to BishopAccountability.org, after its founder, the Rev. Thomas A. Kane, was accused of financial irregularities. He was later accused of sexual abuse, including allegations of abuse inside the House of Affirmation.
A changing of the guard in the attorney general’s office should not result in years of work leading nowhere. That may not be what’s happening here, behind the scenes. But in light of Shea’s concerns, we add our own.
People can accept that the wheels of justice turn slowly. But if those wheels were to stop turning, in this instance, it would not serve the public interest.