The cardinal strongly resisted inquiries by researchers from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, who had been commissioned by the United States bishops' conference to study how dioceses handled sex-abuse complaints.

Cardinal Mahony retired in 2011 and his successor, Archbishop José Gomez, has told him "he will no longer have any administrative or public duties" in the archdiocese.

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The first term of comparison is the tension between Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles and his predecessor, Cardinal Roger Mahony. On Jan. 31, Gomez announced that Mahony would "no longer have any administrative or public duties" because of failures to protect children from abuse, documented in files released by the archdiocese. That triggered an open letter to Gomez from Mahony acknowledging mistakes, but insisting he went on to make Los Angeles "second to none" in keeping children safe.

Mahony remains a priest and bishop in good standing, and he really hasn't had any administrative role since stepping down in March 2011. The practical effect of the action thus is limited, but symbolically it amounts to what Jesuit Fr. Tom Reese has called a "public shaming."

So far, the Vatican hasn't said much other than it's paying attention and clarifying that the action applies only to Los Angeles.

Behind door No. 2 lies the highly public spat in 2010 between Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna, Austria, and Italian Cardinal Angelo Sodano, a former Secretary of State and still the dean of the College of Cardinals.

For those whose memories may have dimmed, a series of clerical abuse scandals exploded across Europe in early 2010, which among other things cast a critical spotlight on Benedict XVI's personal record. Sodano created a media sensation in April 2010 by calling that criticism "petty gossip" during the Vatican's Easter Mass.

In a session with Austrian journalists not long afterward, Schönborn not only said Sodano had "deeply wronged" abuse victims, but he also charged that Sodano had blocked an investigation of Schönborn's disgraced predecessor, Cardinal Hans Hermann Gröer, who had been accused of molesting seminarians and monks and who resigned in 1995. Schönborn reportedly said that then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, wanted to take action, but he lost an internal Vatican argument to Sodano. Continue reading

Sources

• John L Allen Jr in National Catholic Reporter
• Image: Daily News Los Angeles

John L Allen Jr is NCR senior correspondent.

At the same time, Archbishop Gomez complied with a court order by releasing 12,000 pages of documents containing the personnel files of clergy accused of sexual abuse and posting the files online.

He also accepted the resignation of Auxiliary Bishop Thomas Curry, regional bishop for Santa Barbara, who was at one time Cardinal Mahony's vicar for clergy and chief advisor on sex abuse cases.

Archbishop Gomez succeeded Cardinal Mahony as archbishop of Los Angeles in 2011.

The documents released showed that Cardinal Mahony, 76, and Bishop Curry, 70, both worked to send priests accused of abuse out of the state to shield them from scrutiny.

"I find these files to be brutal and painful reading," Archbishop Gomez said. "The behaviour described in these files is terribly sad and evil. There is no excuse, no explaining away what happened to these children. The priests involved had the duty to be their spiritual fathers and they failed."

He added: "We need to acknowledge that terrible failure today. We need to pray for everyone who has ever been hurt by members of the Church. And we need to continue to support the long and painful process of healing their wounds and restoring the trust that was broken."

Jesuit Father Tom Reese of Georgetown University's Woodstock Theological Center and author of several books about the power structure of the Church, said Archbishop Gomez's steps were extraordinary.

"An archbishop has never before restricted the ministry of his predecessor and publicly taken him to task like this," he said.

In a response, Cardinal Mahony said "nothing in my own background or education" equipped him to deal with the sexual abuse of children.

He said the advice he was given was "to remove priests from active ministry if there was reasonable suspicion that abuse had occurred, and then refer them to one of the several residential treatment centres across the country for evaluation and recommendation", and was never told that these procedures were not effective.

He also claimed that under his leadership the archdiocese became "second to none in protecting children and youth".

Sources:

Los Angeles Times

Catholic News Service

National Catholic Reporter

Image: Zimbio