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April 17, 2008

Pope visit: A 'historic' meeting with sex-abuse victims

WASHINGTON -- After his third public call in as many days for healing of the victims of Roman Catholic clergy victims of sex abuse, Pope Benedict XVI met with several of them today,
according to a papal spokesman.

The Reverend Federico said the visiting Benedict met with the victims and Archbishop of Boston Cardinal Sean P. O'Malley after celebrating Mass today at Washington Nationals Park.

One of the victims Bernard McDade of Lynn, Mass., who was one of more than a dozen parishioners of the late Joseph Birmingham, a priest who sexually abused boys in parishes outside Boston between 1961 and his death in 1989.

"This man was allowed to breed his pedophilia from parish to parish," McDade told the AP six years ago this month as the widening scandal triggered a crisis in the archdiocese, with charges that then-Cardinal Bernard F. Law and other high church officials had long been aware of the abuse and failed to put a stop to it.

Law resigned in disgrace in 2002. He was replaced in 2003 by O'Malley, a bearded, sandal-wwearing Capuchin friar who first impressed church leaders with his handling of sex abuse scandal around the Rev. James Porter in the Fall River diocese.

"This is a historic moment," said Raymond L. Flynn, former U.S. ambassador to the Vatican, who was told by one of the Boston-area victims that his long-awaited meeting with the pontiff had come through.

"Now the pope has opened the door, and the healing can finally begin," said Flynn, who is also a former Boston mayor.

Referring to the pope's latest admonition to Catholic clergy to bind the wounds of the sex-abuse victims, Flynn said, "Now the pope has done his part in the process. He's a man of his word."

"This was an extraordinary gesture, a tremendous gesture" that breaks with a long-standing tradition of papal distance from the pastoral concerns of individual Catholics, said Msgr. Paul Theroux, the vicar general of the Roman Catholic Diocese in Providence.

Theroux has handled the sex-abuse scandal for the diocese and has experience in dealing with the Vatican.

Video: The Reverend Federico describes the pope's meeting with victims of clergy sex abuse.

-- John E. Mulligan, Journal Washington bureau

"This is the head of the universal church, the vicar of Christ on earth. The Holy Father on a day to day basis deals with heads of state," Theroux said, explaining that a pope almost always handles pastoral concerns through the church hierarchy. Therefore, Theroux said, the pope's meeting with the abuse victims today is strikingly dramatic to any students of papal history.

Coming after three successive days in which Benedict discussed the shame of the sex abuse scandal in terms unprecedented for a pope, Theroux said that Benedict's meeting with the sex-abuse victims will carry a powerful symbolic message throughout the church.

"Even though this is only a small, representative group" of the many Catholics harmed by abusive priests, Theroux said today's meeting "speaks of how significant this issue is to the Holy Father."

However, Theroux said he thinks it unlikely that many individual victims of the sex abuse or the organized groups that represent them "will suddenly say tomorrow, `Well, now we've turned the corner.' "

Theroux said he also fears that because the pope has met with so few victims today, some critics will view the gesture as insufficient.

Earlier this week, Journal reporters John E. Mulligan and Richard Dujardin, who are covering the visit, have captured comments about Benedict's remarks on the sex-abuse scandal from several local officials.

They include former Vatican Ambassador and ex-Boston Mayor Raymond Flynn, Congressman James Langevin, D-R.I., and Diocese of Providence Bishop Thomas J. Tobin.

Audio: Listen to an audio clip featuring some of their comments.

Posted by Andrea Panciera at 5:31 PM | Permalink

April 17, 2008

Pope visit: A 'historic' meeting with sex-abuse victims

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