BUFFALO (NY)
National Catholic Reporter
July 16, 2018
By Peter Feuerherd
Catholics in Buffalo, New York, are undergoing their Boston moment on sex abuse, 16 years removed from the events that rocked the wider church in the United States.
On Feb. 27, Michael Whalen, 52, held a press conference at which he accused retired priest Fr. Norbert Orsolits of abuse inflicted when Whalen was a minor. Orsolits, now 78, told a Buffalo News reporter that he was guilty of dozens of such crimes, had undergone therapy at a rehabilitation facility in Canada, and then returned to the diocese as an active priest, until being removed from ministry and forced to retire in 2003. His early retirement was a result of the charter enacted by the U.S. bishops in Dallas in 2002, which prohibited ministry by any priest credibly accused of sex abuse.
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