Boston Cardinal Sean O'Malley told US network CBS that the case of Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City is "a question the Holy See needs to address urgently".

Bishop Finn was found guilty in 2012 of a criminal misdemeanour count of shielding a priest who was a threat to children.

The priest, Shawn Ratigan, was found guilty in 2013 of producing child pornography and was sentenced to 50 years in jail.

Bishop Finn was sentenced to two years probation for waiting six months before telling police that diocesan officials had found pornographic images of young girls on Ratigan's computer.

Cardinal O'Malley, who heads the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, said Pope Francis recognises the need to address the Bishop Finn situation.

Speaking to CBS News, Cardinal O'Malley agreed that under the Catholic Church's zero-tolerance policy, he wouldn't let Bishop Finn teach Sunday school in Boston, let alone head a diocese.

CBS interviewer Norah O'Donnell put it to Cardinal O'Malley that one of the "biggest scandals" of the Church in recent years is the way bishops handled priests accused of abuse.

Cardinal O'Malley responded that is something he and the commission are working on.

"One of the first things that we came up was the importance of accountability and we're looking at how the Church can have protocols and how to respond when a bishop has not been responsible for protection of children in his diocese," he stated.

In September, Canadian Archbishop Terrence Prendergast visited Kansas City diocese on behalf of the Vatican to investigate Bishop Finn's leadership.

In the CBS interview, Cardinal O'Malley also called a Vatican doctrinal investigation of American nuns "a disaster".

Cardinal O'Malley is one of the council of cardinal advisors to Pope Francis.

The CBS 60 Minutes item was broadcast on November 16.

Sources

• National Catholic Reporter
• Crux Now
• Image: National Catholic Reporter

Bishop Finn was the first Catholic prelate in the United States to be found criminally guilty of shielding a guilty priest in the sex abuse crisis.

Canadian Archbishop Terrence Prendergast of Ottawa visited Kansas City-St Joseph last week, and spoke with about a dozen people, the National Catholic Reporter stated.

The main question he asked was reportedly "Do you think [Finn] is fit to be a leader?"

One priest who spoke with the archbishop didn't recall the question being quite that "bold".

Archbishop Prendergast was carrying out the visitation on behalf of the Congregation for Bishops.

Bishop Finn, who has led the Kansas City diocese since 2005, has come under sustained criticism.

He was convicted in 2012 of a misdemeanour count of failing to report suspected child abuse in the case of a now-former priest, Fr Shawn Ratigan, who was producing child pornography.

Ratigan, now laicised, received a 50 year jail sentence last year.

In November 2011, Bishop Finn avoided misdemeanour charges by agreeing to give prosecutors immediate oversight of the diocese's sexual abuse reporting procedures.

The Kansas City diocese has also been facing several lawsuits for sexual abuse claims and has made a number of large financial settlements in recent years.

Bishop Finn hiked the payments by parishes to the diocese to cover expenses and the number of Catholics in the diocese has declined by nearly a quarter in 10 years.

The NCR reported that one person who spoke with Archbishop Prendergast didn't think Bishop Finn is fit to be a leader.

"I told the archbishop I thought [Finn] was holy but didn't have the organisational skills for the diocese," the source reportedly said.

A spokesperson for the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests said that investigations of complicit Church officials should not start with one whose guilt has already been proven.

The headquarters of the NCR are located in Bishop Finn's dioceses and there have been skirmishes between the paper and the bishop over the role of Catholic media.

In 2013, NCR columnist Bill Tammeus published an open letter to Pope Francis calling on Bishop Finn to resign.

Sources

• National Catholic Reporter
• Kansas City Star
• LifesiteNews
• Bill Tammeus (NCR)
• Image: CNN

In a column for World Communications Day in his diocesan paper, The Catholic Key, Bishop Finn said he had a responsibility to "instruct the Faithful about the problematic nature of this media source which bears the name ‘Catholic' ".

He said he had been "deluged with emails and other correspondence from Catholics concerned about the editorial stances of the Reporter: officially condemning Church teaching on the ordination of women, insistent undermining of Church teaching on artificial contraception and sexual morality in general, lionizing dissident theologies while rejecting established Magisterial teaching, and a litany of other issues".

Bishop Finn — who was once editor of the St Louis diocesan newspaper — said he had asked the Reporter to "submit their bona fides as a Catholic media outlet in accord with the expectations of Church law" but the paper declined to participate, indicating it considered itself an "independent newspaper which commented on ‘things Catholic' ".

The 49-year-old Reporter, which describes itself as "one of the few independent journalistic outlets for Catholics and others who struggle with the complex moral and societal issues of the day", has won many awards for its journalism.

Last year it called for Bishop Finn to resign after he became the first bishops in the United States to be convicted of failing to report a priest suspected of child sex-abuse.

Reponding to Bishop Finn's column, the Reporter's publisher, Thomas Fox, said his paper had enjoyed cordial relations with most of his predecessors, one of whom blessed its building.

He added: "NCR is proud to call itself a Catholic publication. We report and comment on church matters, including official teachings. We also report and comment on those who call into question some of these official teachings."

Sources:

The Catholic Key

National Catholic Reporter

Image: USA Today