A timeline of the Kiesle case

After reading the documents posted on the web site of the New York Times, I have compiled the following timeline:

April 25, 1981

Fr. Louis Dabovich, Pastor of the Church of the Good Shepherd in Pittsburgh, CA, writes to Cardinal Seper at the CDF to “recommend” Kiesle’s petition be granted “because of reverential fear or human respect and above all the immaturity and consequent lack of responsibility.” Fr. Dabovich continues, “Stephen had a very domineering mother who was instrumental in sending him to the seminary and later in seeing him ordained a Priest.”

Fr. Dabovich notes that Keisle, as a Deacon, “worked with teen-agers and children in our CCD program… Yet he acted as one of them: played ball with them; took them to outings and to shows and spent time in their homes. I was somewhat concerned, but had never received any unfavorable comments. Only some years after he left this parish did I learn of some improprieties that were going on while he was here.

Fr. Dabovich did not that prior to Kiesle’s ordination to the priesthood he spoke with the former Bishop regarding Kielse’s “literature he was reading, the magazine’s he had in his room, and in general his lack of maturity and spirituality.

Fr. Dabovich makes no mention of Kiesle’s crimes. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith cannot be expected to have known what it was not told.

May 8, 1981

Fr. George Crespin, Chancellor of the Diocese of Oakland, writes to Cardinal Seper at the CDF to recommend that Kiesle’s petition be granted. Kiesle was an assistant to Fr. Crespin during the last three years of Kiesle’s ministry at Our Lady of the Rosary Parish in Union City, CA.

Fr. Crespin told Cardinal Seper that Kiesle’s family was not supportive of his ordination, that “the authorities at the seminary question whether he should continue his preparation for the priesthood,” and that Kiesle’s motivations for seeking the priesthood were “guided more by an effort to contradict the opinions of others” rather than an authentic desire.

Now the CDF has two reason Kiesle sought ordination, neither of which seem to square with the other. First, he is forced into it by his mother; second, his ego drives him forward.

Fr. Crespin went on to write that though Kiesle’s main interest pastorally was with young people, he did not relate well with adults and other activities not relating to the youth. He also notes several times that Kiesle “shows signs of an arrested development.”

Fr. Crespin does mention “the eventual difficulty that Father Kiesle had with the law because of his relationship to young children,” but fails to mention what that difficulty might have been. Or it’s frequency. Fr. Crespin says the parishioners expressed dissatisfaction with Kiesle because of his “indifference and adolescent behavior.”

Fr. Crespin says that while Crespin was on sabbatical, Kiesle because involved in “questionable relationships with young children” and that he was “confident that the Acta already possesses a sufficient description of the nature of the difficulties so I will not elaborate here.”

He mentions Kiesle received “widespread” publicity because of these questionable relationships, but does say what they involved or how serious they were, or there number.

Fr. Crespin concludes, saying Kiesle has been in therapy and “is much more able to deal with himself and with his problems than he was at the time of his difficulty,” and that it would be prudent to grant his requested dispensation.

We now have two letters to the CDF and neither of them speak to the seriousness, sinfulness or criminality of Kiesle’s past. The first does not so much as to hint at it and the second uses coded language that might only be guessed at in hindsight by one who’s native language is not English.

June 19, 1981

Bishop John Cummins, Bishop of Oakland, writes to Pope John Paul II to “present” Kiesle’s petition for laicization. Notice the Bishop does not himself petition for Kiesle’s laicization.

Saying that “quite probably Father Kiesle should never have been ordained,” Bishop Cummins notes that Kiesle “has experienced a variety of psychological, emotional, and sexual difficulties during his priesthood.”

It is in this letter, for the first time, that mention is made of Kiesle’s crimes (but not to the CDF, which did not handle these cases at this time anyway): “In August of 1978 he was arrested by the police and charged with having taken sexual liberties with at least six young men ranging from eleven to thirteen years of age during the period November 1977 through May 1978.”

Two things are of note here: first, that three years transpired before the Holy Father was notified of this, and, second, that even under canon law eleven to thirteen year olds are children and not “young men.”

The Holy Father is told Kiesle pleaded “nolo contendere” and was given a “three years suspended sentence and was to remain on probation for three years” and that Kiesle took a leave of absence at this time.

Bishop Cummins calls the media attention Kiesle received “unfortunate” and notes that Kiesle showed “great cooperation in seeking out psychiatric help when asked.” Bishop Cummins found at this time that Kiesle had a problem with “obedience and authority,” and this at a time when Bishop Cummins “arranged with two neighboring bishops to provide employment in special assignments for him outside of pastoral ministry.”

Where is the outrage against Bishop Cummins or against the other two Bishops?

Bishop Cummins suggests that, because of “Kiesle’s irrevocable decision to leave the active ministry, it would seem to me most prudent that this petition be granted.”

Again, two things here: first, the decision for Kiesle to leave the active ministry should have rested with Bishop Cummins, and, two, Bishop Cummins prior judgments regarding Kiesle don’t look too prudent.

17 November 1981

The CDF writes to Bishop Cummins requesting additional information on the case of Kiesle. This letter does not bear Cardinal Ratzinger’s signature, unless he used two very distinct signatures.

February 1, 1982

Bishop Cummins writes to Cardinal Ratzinger to respond to the CDF’s request for more information. He sends the CDF a statement of Fr. James Laubacher, whose “memory is really quite weak”; the seminary papers concerning Kiesle; and Kiesle’s oath taken at his interrogation.

These documents are not available on the web site of the New York Times. I wonder what they contain.

It is in this letter that Bishop Cummins suggests no scandal would be given if Kiesle’s petition were granted. I think he’s bit a disingenuous here.

It might be asked why it took Bishop Cummins two months to respond to the CDF’s request if he was in such a hurry for Kiesle’s petition to be granted.

September 24, 1982

Fr. George Mockel writes to Cardinal Ratzinger at the CDF to inquire into the status of Kiesle’s petition.

December 20, 1983

Fr. George Mockel writes to Bishop Cummins regarding a “letter from your friend, Fr. Rev. Thomas J. Herron.” Fr. Mockel says that Keisle’s case was first sent to Rome on July 7, 1981 and that a request was sent from “Cardinal Ratzinger” for more information on November 17, 1981. Fr. Mockel says this information was sent to the CDF on February 11, 1982.

Perhaps a typographical error was made on of the two letters.

Fr. Mockel mentions a response to his letter of September 24, 1982 was received from the CDF on October 21, 1982 in which he was told the matter would be investigated “at an opportune time.”

It must be noted that the CDF has only a limited staff. It should also be noted that we are not provided a copy of this letter from the CDF.

Fr. Mockel then refers to what may be two additional cases sent to Rome involving two other priests and suggests Bishop Cummins writes a letter; the names have been blacked out.

17 January 1984

Nearly a month later, Bishop Cummins writes to Fr. John Herron who worked at the CDF. I suspect the earlier letter from the CDF bears Fr. Herron’s signature; it certainly looks like it does, much more so than Ratzinger.

Bishop Cummins says “it would be impossible to have” Kiesle return to ministry.

Remember: this decision rested squarely with Bishop Cummins, not with the CDF.

Bishop Cummins then refers to the case of a priest from Brooklyn, whose name has been blacked out.

September 13, 1985

Bishop Cummins writes to Cardinal Ratzinger to inquire as to the status of Kiesle’s case.

September 17, 1985

Fr. George Mockel writes to Bishop Cummins saying he wrote another letter to Cardinal Ratzinger.

We are not provided a copy of this letter.

September 27, 1985

Fr. Mockel writes to Cardinal Laghi and asks him to forward a letter to Cardinal Ratzinger.

November 6, 1985

Cardinal Ratzinger writes to Bishop Cummins, saying, according to the NYT’s translation, that although the CDF “regards the arguments presented in favor of removal in this case to be of grave significance” more time would be needed to study the case.

The media has ignored this line of the letter.

What needs to be remembered is this: at the time, Cardinal Ratzinger was following the procedure as it was laid down in law. Priests were not to be laicized younger than 40. As soon as Kiesle turned 40, he was laicized.

12 December 1985

Fr. Mockel writes to Bishop Cummins telling him he has received on November 15, 1985 a response from Cardinal Ratzinger.

With such interest in the case previously, it seems strange to have waited for nearly a month to inform the Bishop of the letter.

January 13, 1986

Bishop Cummins writes to Kiesle to inform him of the letter from Cardinal Ratzinger.

Again, it seems strange, after his previous eagerness, to wait another month before writing to Kiesle.

Winters criticizes media reports

Michael Sean Winters has published a piece in America Magazine, titled, "The Frustratingly Poor Quality of Press Coverage."

His text follows, with my emphases and comments:

The whole world now knows about Father Stephen Kiesle of Oakland [just a small exaggeration], the priest who tied up young boys and molested them sexually and whose request to be defrocked came before then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger. The press is swarming with assertions that, as the Washington Post headlined its story, "Future pope balked at defrocking priest." This, we are led to believe, is the smoking gun. Raztinger signed the letter in 1985. That is HIS signature. Case closed. Here are the documents.

In talking to reporters, I raised the question: Why was this case in front of Ratzinger in the first place. It does not make sense. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith was given jurisdiction over cases of the "graviora delicta" of sexual abuse only in 2001. Before that time, it is a bit unclear who had immediate jurisdiction in Rome, although one point – which I also made to reporters – went unmentioned then and in all the reporting about the future Pope’s role in handling sex abuse cases, namely, the local bishop has the authority to remove a priest from the clerical state [Exactly. The local Bishop has more authority in these matters than the media wants us to know so they can continue to paint Pope Benedict XVI as the bad guy]. Recourse to Rome is necessary only to dispense a priest from his vow of celibacy, so that he can subsequently be married in the Church [removal from ministry lies with the local bishop].

Perhaps, some of the confusion has to do with the translation from Latin that the original AP story procured from the chairman of the Classics Department at USC which translates "Hoc dicasterium" as "this court." I do not question the Chairman of the Classics Department’s command of Latin, but a dicastery in the Vatican is not a court, but an agency or department. The CDF did not then and does not now serve as a canonical court.

But, then it hit me: I was asking about the dog that had not barked. The documents exchanged between the diocesan officials in Oakland and the CDF do not mention "graviora delicta." The case was presented as a priest seeking laicization. As well, the documents do not paint the profound ugliness of the priest’s crimes. The first document posted at the Times is a 1981 letter from a parish priest who worked with Kiesle. It says that Kiesle lacked "maturity and responsibility and spirituality" and says he only became a priest to please his over-bearing mother. The second document, also from 1981 and also from a priest who worked with Kiesle, says that Kiesle’s family was opposed to his becoming a priest and claims that Kiesle was irresponsible and had trouble relating to adults. The letter refers to "the eventual difficulty that Father Kiesle had with the law because of his relationship to young children" but there are no details [what I've been saying is true].

The third document finally is explicit. In the "Votum Episcopi," the document by which the bishop demonstrates his support for Father Kiesle’s request for laicization, Bishop John Cummins notes that Kiesle had been arrested for molesting six boys, had pleaded "nolo contendere" and received a three-year suspended sentence [finally there is a mention of the background]. Three facts jump out. First, the request for defrocking was made by Father Kiesle, not by the bishop [again, what I said earlier is true]. Second, the priest had already been removed from active ministry, so the case did not seem urgent insofar as protecting children in the future was concerned (remember, Kiesle was only asking CDF to dispense him from his vows). Third, the response from and punishment by the civil authorities were not as severe as the crime warranted [where is the media's outrage at this?]. As we now know, very few people understood the nature of pedophilia, otherwise civil authorities would not have imposed a three- or five-year statute of limitations, and the penalties for what amounted to rape would have been more severe. It turns out that the emotional scars of sex abuse are worse than physical scars of physical abuse, not least because they are often unseen.

One other part of Cummins’s letter to Cardinal Ratzinger seems to have escaped the attention of the assembled press corps. The bishop notes that the trial generated "a great deal of publicity surrounding his conduct." The bishop says that all the local papers covered the story. So, the idea that Cardinal Raztinger subsequently dragged his feet to avoid publicity is an odd charge, one that the documents do not support [surprise, surprise]. When Cardinal Ratzinger replied that the "good of the universal Church" should be considered in adjudicating the case, he was evidently not trying to prevent adverse publicity. That publicity had already occurred.

What, then, was Ratzinger’s concern? Why did he not simply grant Father Kiesle’s request for laicization and be done with it? As noted above, the extraordinary nature of Father Kiesle’s crimes is not at all clear from the correspondence, which uses euphemisms to describe what amounted to child rape. The weak punishment by the civil authorities certainly would not indicate the outrages this priest perpetrated. Additionally, the initiative is coming from the priest, not from the bishop, as one might expect in a case of this sort.

Another factor explaining Ratzinger’s invocation of the "good of the universal Church" was a change of policy going on at the Vatican in the early 1980s. In the years after the Council, many priests asked to be laicized. George Weigel, in his biography of Pope John Paul II, writes: "Pope Paul VI had granted more than 32,000 requests from priests who had asked to be released from their vows and returned to lay status – the greatest exodus from the priesthood since the Reformation. Soon after his election, John Paul had stopped the routine granting of these ‘decrees of laicization.’" John Paul was especially concerned about younger priests seeking to be defrocked, and very few such requests were granted to priests under the age of 40. It is telling that Father Kiesle’s request for laicization was granted as soon as he did turn 40.

What had Pope John Paul, and Cardinal Ratzinger, worried was that the sacramental character of priestly ordination was being obscured by the ease with which priests were being dispensed from their vows. Catholics do not see the priesthood as a career choice, to be set aside if something better comes along. When a man is ordained, the Church believes that God affects an ineffaceable and permanent change upon the ordinand, just as the Church believes that bread and wine are truly changed into the Body and Blood of Christ at Mass. Even a priest who is laicized retains the power to say Mass and absolve from sins in confession, even though the Church strips him of the authority to do so.

Had the Oakland case been presented as an instance of "graviora delicta" I do not doubt that the laicization would have been faster [nor have I]. Had the bishop or other officials in Oakland made clear the heinous nature of the crimes, I do not doubt Cardinal Ratzinger would have responded differently. I also do not doubt that even the mention of the civil trial involving charges of molestation should have caused Cardinal Ratzinger to find out more about the case - oops, that is precisely what he did and for which he now stands accused of dragging his feet. I also suspect that this case, which stands astride the promulgation of the new Code of Canon Law in 1983, may have been impeded because the canonical officials in Oakland and in Rome were still becoming acquainted with its provisions.

It is the job of religion reporters to not only report on information but to provide the context for interpreting that information. The documents in the Oakland case raise certain obvious questions that the press ignores or fails to perceive – I do not know which is worse. I do not "blame" the media for the sex abuse crisis and I do blame the Vatican for doing such a horrendous job of answering the current questions and for seeing themselves as the victim. Nonetheless, I believe the press corps is guilty of shoddy reporting. The documents in the Oakland case are no "smoking gun" but they are presented as such. The feeding frenzy among the press corps has taken hold and everybody wants to be Woodward and Bernstein. Shame on them.

Capello tip to Fr. Zuhlsdorf.

For the good of the Church?

Today Fr. Ray Blake has a very fine post on the "for the good for the Universal Church" that Cardinal Ratzinger used in a letter regarding the Kiesle case.

Here is a snippet:

Once a priest is reduced to the lay state a bishop has no more authority over him than he does over any other lay person. He cannot restrict his movement, to another part of the country where he would be unknown, or restrict his involvement with secular organisations, such as youth groups or schools, neither can a bishop order to him to undergo therapy, or to co-operate with an ecclesiastical trial. In the Kiesle case granting his petition for laicisation would have placed him not only outside of the bishop's jurisdiction but also given him the opportunity of moving out of the jurisdiction of the civil authorities who were aware of his crimes, which were in the Oakland area in the public domain.

Thus the phrase for "the good of the universal Church" far from being a dereliction of duty and cover-up on the part of the future Pope, as so many secular commentators have suggested, is the complete opposite.

Be sure to read the rest of it.

Is Pope Benedict qualified for role as Universal Pastor?

Last night a friend asked me about an article she read that claimed Pope Benedict had only been a pastor a short time. I had not seen the article but found it this morning over at What Does the Prayer Really Say? where Fr. John Zuhlsdorf gives his take on the article.

The article in question is written by Vanessa Gera for the Associated Press and titled "Pope's ivory tower past adds to his detachment."

The headline itself is sensationally over the top so - with a discerning mind and a just a pinch of common sense - you can already guess the accuracy of the article.

At any rate, her text follows, with my emphases and comments:

VATICAN CITY – Long before entering Vatican life, Pope Benedict XVI won renown as a theologian and a German university professor, penning more than 40 books and winning a devoted following of students who respected his prodigious memory and brilliant mind.

One thing absent from his resume? Significant time as a parish priest.

Joseph Ratzinger, the future pope, only worked 15 months tending to a flock in the 59 years since taking his vows, instead closing himself in the ivory tower of academia — a background that may help account for his troubled handling of the sex abuse crisis engulfing the church [If Ms. Gera would read even a couple of his more than 40 books, she might well learn that he is not separated from everyday life as she presumes].

For one, it adds to the impression of an out-of-touch pontiff who simply doesn't grasp the enormity of the fury around the world over mounting evidence of sex abuse by priests [only if you want it to do so; not everyone has that impression of the Pontiff], and inaction on the part of the Vatican and Benedict himself.

Benedict's very legacy will be shaped by whether this aging pontiff, who turns 83 on Friday, can embrace a new openness and express remorse in straightforward language free of the stilted defensiveness of many Vatican pronouncements to date [Perhaps Ms. Gera should read the letter he wrote to the Irish. Or what he has said when he has met with victims of sexual abuse. Or what he did to expedite abuse cases at the CDF. He has certainly expressed "a new openness" and "remorse." Ms. Gera is more aloof and out-of-touch than she realizes].

"Pope Ratzinger, more lucid than many of his defenders, must keep from being suffocated by Professor Ratzinger," Marco Politi, a veteran Vatican reporter, wrote in a column last week in the daily Il Fatto [this guy's just as clueless as Gera. A suffocating professor does not continue to draw crowds in such large numbers as Pope Benedict does, more than Pope John Paul II. He might consider reading or even just listening to what Pope Benedict says].

But in his native Germany, the prominent Der Spiegel magazine has already declared his papacy a failure [and everyone knows Der Spiegel is not only the voice of reason but the governing mind of the universe. How can a papacy be declared a failure when it isn't over? He already has attained many unexpected victories: dialogue with Jews and Muslims; reunification with the Traditional Anglican Communion; and nearing reunification with the Russian Orthodox, just to name a few], speaking in its most recent issue of "the tragedy of a man who had set out to write books and, only near the end of his life, was summoned to assume the Herculean office at the Vatican."

Even the pope's staunchest admirers say he's not the best manager [who is? With the media's hatred of the Church, no Pope can ever live up to what they expect of him for to do so would be to deny the faith of Jesus Christ].

"Benedict XVI is only infallible as an authoritative teacher of the faith, not as an administrator," noted the Rev. Joseph Fessio, who wrote his doctoral dissertation under Ratzinger and participates in the annual "student circle" discussions Benedict hosts each summer with his former students.

Some of Benedict's critics, however, say the pope's real problems lie mainly with a practice of surrounding himself with unqualified advisers [that's possible, but has nothing to do with the headline].

"He doesn't have grade A types around him — but he picked them," said the Rev. Richard McBrien, a theologian at the University of Notre Dame and frequent critic of the pope [McBrien isn't exactly a grade A type himself].

McBrien noted that although Ratzinger served only a short time as a parish priest, his five years as archbishop of Munich and Freising gave him ample real-world experience. He said Ratzinger engaged fully with even the small details of administration there and later as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the church's doctrine office.

Yet his tenure in Munich provides precisely one of the more damning cases of sex abuse that have swirled around the pope himself: In the 1980s, Ratzinger approved therapy for a suspected pedophile priest, but the prelate was allowed to resume pastoral work while in therapy [this claim has already been shown to be false].

The Vatican has insisted that Ratzinger's vicar took full responsibility for letting the Rev. Peter Hullermann resume pastoral work and that the future pope was unaware [the Archdiocese of Munich has said so, as well, and the then-Vicar General has also accepted full responsibility for the decision and has said Ratzinger was unaware. This is lousy "reporting"]. Hullermann in 1986 was handed a suspended sentence for molesting a boy.

In addition, while running the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Ratzinger resisted pleas from a California diocese to laicize a priest who had pleaded no contest to lewd conduct for tying up and molesting two boys, according to correspondence obtained by The Associated Press [a claim which has also been proven false].

The Vatican's lawyer has insisted the California bishop was responsible for making sure the priest, the Rev. Stephen Kiesle, didn't abuse while Rome processed his case to remove him from the priesthood [both of which are true].

"The pope's background as a professor of theology has little or nothing to do with the present controversy. It is simply one of the excuses offered by his well-intentioned defenders," McBrien told the AP [I've seen no such defense offered for the Holy Father. What a ridiculous claim.].

Despite Benedict's missteps, there are a few signs that some understanding of the outrage is starting to penetrate the Vatican's medieval walls [only a few? Really, where is this person?].

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, long a bastion of protecting Vatican secrecy [for the good of the accused and of the victims; whatever happend to innocent until proven guilty?], is seeking greater openness with plans to post on its Web site Monday a concise and simply written guide to how it handles sex abuse allegations. And in his recent letter to the Irish bishops, Benedict urged greater cooperation with civil authorities in cases of pedophile priests and said he'd meet with more victims [and that those responsible would be brought before tribunals; maybe she missed that part].

In a way, the scandal may be bringing Ratzinger full circle back to his short term as a parish chaplain [but she said above this has nothing to do with the present media attacks. Which one is it?]. Ratzinger served as chaplain at the Precious Blood church in Munich for just over a year, teaching religious instruction, hearing confessions and running a youth group. In his memoirs, Ratzinger said he felt unprepared for such practical work, yet once back in academia, said he missed the day-to-day contact with people that it entailed [every newly ordained priest is unprepared for the week given him and, if people are honest, everyone is not fully prepared for their first day on the job. I daresay Ms. Gera is unprepared to write this article].

Peder Noergaard-Hoejen, a Danish theologian on a Catholic-Lutheran commission seeking to forge better understanding between the two faiths, sees some movement toward a more modern approach.

"A new openness and a turn away from secrecy mark a break with a tradition going back centuries," he told the AP.

Still, he admits Benedict lacks the ideal credentials for his current job.

"I think he was very good for the position he had before he became pope because this was an intellectual position," Noergaard-Hoejen said. "It is of course important that the pope be able to think, but Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI, is no politician [The Pope is not supposed to be a politician. Maybe that's where Luther went wrong - or at least his successors]. His type is that of a German professor" [whatever that means].

Fr. Selvester on the scandal

Over at Shouts in the Piazza, Fr. Guy Selvester kindly links to a post of mine - that I found over at What Does the Prayer Really Say? - and offers his own comments on the abuse scandal.

His comments follow, with my emphases and comments:

Fr. Zehnle at Servant and Steward posts a nice list of the facts in the Kiesele case. You remember facts? Those are the things the secular media gloss over in their rabid efforts to find a smoking gun that will bring down the pope (and, by extension his liturgical reforms and the credibility of the whole Church while they're at it).

Again: the truth MUST come out if the Church is ever to continue to be a force for good in the world. It will be embarrassing; it will be awkward; it will be painful and, yes, some heads will have to roll. But, the truth will always be something through which good will come. We in the Church have to face the truth of how clerical sexual abuse has been mishandled in the past so that we can grow in our understanding and take steps to prevent this from continuing in the future.

That's gonna hurt.

But, in the end, we will be better for it and people might begin to trust us again bcause we'll have earned their trust.

However, in the age of the internet and 24-hour news channels journalistic integrity has been sacrificed to the all-powerful god of "getting the scoop on everyone else". AP now joins that bunch with their supposed "exclusive" story about the Kiesele case. What were they more interested in? That they had uncovered something newsworthy or that it was "exclusive" to them? I wonder.

Pope Benedict is not the villain of this story. The fact that they keep creatively leaving parts of the story out proves it. The search for the truth must be genuine not trumped up. The Pope is not going to be a scapegoat here. And has anyone considered that the way the media are handling this is also a form of violence and abuse against people who have already been the victims of sexual misconduct?

The real truth of how this was mishandled is NOT going to found on the desk of Benedict XVI or in some "worldwide conspiracy" centered at the Vatican (as if the Vatican were some kind of federal government for the Church). It will be found in chancery offices all over the world in separate but unrelated cases that have only one thing in common: they were all done by men who thought they had the best interest of the Church in mind while trying to hush up the truth [Precisely! The New York Times has shown this to be true with the Murphy case in Milwaukee and the Associated Press has shown this to be true with the Kiesle case in Oakland, even if they haven't quite realized that have done so].

More is the pity.

Lawler sets the media straight

Over at Catholic Culture, Phil Lawler has done an excellent job in answering the questions raised by the media (with my emphases and comments):

We're off and running once again, with another completely phony story that purports to implicate Pope Benedict XVI in the protection of abusive priests.

The "exclusive" story released by AP yesterday, which has been dutifully passed along now by scores of major media outlets, would never have seen the light of day if normal journalistic standards had been in place. Careful editors should have asked a series of probing questions, and in every case the answer to those questions would have shown that the story had no "legs."
First to repeat the bare-bones version of the story: in November 1985, then-Cardinal Ratzinger signed a letter deferring a decision on the laicization of Father Stephen Kiesle, a California priest who had been accused of molesting boys.

Now the key questions:

• Was Cardinal Ratzinger responding to the complaints of priestly pedophilia? No. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which the future Pontiff headed, did not have jurisdiction for pedophile priests until 2001. The cardinal was weighing a request for laicization of Kiesle.

• Had Oakland's Bishop John Cummins sought to laicize Kiesle as punishment for his misconduct? No. Kiesle himself asked to be released from the priesthood. The bishop supported the wayward priest's application.

• Was the request for laicization denied? No. Eventually, in 1987, the Vatican approved Kiesle's dismissal from the priesthood.

• Did Kiesle abuse children again before he was laicized? To the best of our knowledge, No. The next complaints against him arose in 2002: 15 years after he was dismissed from the priesthood.

• Did Cardinal Ratzinger's reluctance to make a quick decision mean that Kiesle remained in active ministry? No. Bishop Cummins had the authority to suspend the predator-priest, and in fact he had placed him on an extended leave of absence long before the application for laicization was entered.

• Would quicker laicization have protected children in California? No. Cardinal Ratzinger did not have the power to put Kiesle behind bars (a very good point). If Kiesle had been defrocked in 1985 instead of 1987, he would have remained at large, thanks to a light sentence from the California courts. As things stood, he remained at large. He was not engaged in parish ministry and had no special access to children.

• Did the Vatican cover up evidence of Kiesle's predatory behavior? No. The civil courts of California destroyed that evidence after the priest completed a sentence of probation-- before the case ever reached Rome (as I've asked again and again, where is the media's outrage against the civil authorities?).

So to review: This was not a case in which a bishop wanted to discipline his priest and the Vatican official demurred. This was not a case in which a priest remained active in ministry, and the Vatican did nothing to protect the children under his pastoral care. This was not a case in which the Vatican covered up evidence of a priest's misconduct. This was a case in which a priest asked to be released from his vows, and the Vatican-- which had been flooded by such requests throughout the 1970s -- wanted to consider all such cases carefully. In short, if you're looking for evidence of a sex-abuse crisis in the Catholic Church, this case is irrelevant.

We Americans know what a sex-abuse crisis looks like. The scandal erupts when evidence emerges that bishops have protected abusive priests, kept them active in parish assignments, covered up evidence of the charges against them, and lied to their people. There is no such evidence in this or any other case involving Pope Benedict XVI.

Competent reporters, when dealing with a story that involves special expertise, seek information from experts in that field. Capable journalists following this story should have sought out canon lawyers to explain the 1985 document-- not merely relied on the highly biased testimony of civil lawyers who have lodged multiple suits against the Church. If they had understood the case, objective reporters would have recognized that they had no story. But in this case, reporters for the major media outlets are far from objective.

The New York Times-- which touched off this feeding frenzy with two error-riddled front-page reports-- seized on the latest "scoop" by AP to say that the 1985 document exemplified:

…the sort of delay that is fueling a renewed sexual abuse scandal in the church that has focused on whether the future pope moved quickly enough to remove known pedophiles from the priesthood, despite pleas from American bishops.

Here we have a complete rewriting of history. Earlier in this decade, American newspapers exposed the sad truth that many American bishops had kept pedophile priests in active ministry. Now the Times, which played an active role in exposing that scandal, would have us believe that the American bishops were striving to rid the priesthood of the predators, and the Vatican resisted!

No, what is "fueling a renewed sexual abuse scandal" is a media frenzy. There is a scandal here, indeed, but it's not the scandal you're reading about in the mass media. The scandal is the complete collapse of journalistic standards in the handling of this story.

Well done, Phil!

The facts of the Kiesle case

Fr. Zuhlsdorf kindly provides these facts of the Kiesle case the media refuses to mention, because they show the Holy Father is innocent of the accusations that hurl at him:

1. At the time, the CDF did not have competence in the cases of clerical pedophilia.
2. The case before the CDF concerned a request by a priest for a dispensation from the obligations of the clerical state.
3. It was not a punitive case or an appeal about a sanction.
4. The request was submitted by the priest and not the priest’s diocese of Oakland.
5. The CDF didn’t grant immediate dispensations to men who were not at least 40 years old.
6. Once the CDF studied the case and the priest reached 40 years of age, the dispensation was granted. There was no cover up.
7. If the Diocese of Oakland was pressing the Holy See to dispense this man so quickly, why did that same Diocese of Oakland permit the suspended priest to work as a volunteer with young people? The Holy See had nothing to do with that.
8. The AP and now all other MSM outlets who without hesitation or verification pick up the AP’s sloppy work, never bother to do background and ask basic questions about procedures and timing. They fail in the basics of curiosity, much less journalistic professionalism.

Goodstein attemps to link Pope to scandal, fails again

There are few things worse than someone who refuses to be taught and the New York Times' Laurie Goodstein seems a prime example of such a student.

In her recent article, "Pope Put Off Punishing Abusive Priest," of which the headline itself is false, Goodstein attempts a second time to link Pope Benedict XVI to the sex abuse scandal. And again she fails, simply because she does not acknowledge history.

Her text follows, with my emphases and comments:

The priest, convicted of tying up and abusing two young boys in a California church rectory, wanted to leave the ministry [and whom might that be? This reads more like a novel than a respectable news story].

But in 1985, four years after the priest and his bishop first asked that he be defrocked, the future Pope Benedict XVI, then a top Vatican official [whose office didn't oversee such cases until 2001, as Goodstein such well know by now], signed a letter saying that the case needed more time and that “the good of the Universal Church” had to be considered in the final decision, according to church documents released through lawsuits.

That decision did not come for two more years [still fourteen years before the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith had responsibility for such cases], the sort of delay that is fueling a renewed sexual abuse scandal in the church [only in the eyes of Goodstein and company] that has focused on whether the future pope moved quickly enough to remove known pedophiles from the priesthood [at the time she is discussing, the decision was not his to make], despite pleas from American bishops [the bishops can remove a priest from active ministry without the consent or direction of the Holy See. As Jimmy Akin rightly points out, laicization is not really at the heart of the matter, but a swift removal from ministry].

As the scandal has deepened, the pope’s defenders have said that, well before he was elected pope in 2005, he grew ever more concerned about sexual abuse and weeding out pedophile priests [which is obvious to anyone who actually examines the facts]. But the case of the California priest, the Rev. Stephen Kiesle, and the trail of documents first reported on Friday by The Associated Press, shows, in this period at least, little urgency [it wasn't his task to see to the case].

The letter that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, later pope, wrote in Latin in 1985, mentions Father Kiesle’s young age — 38 at the time — as one consideration in whether he should be forced from the priesthood. The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said it was wrong to draw conclusions based on one letter, without carefully understanding the context in which it was written [and he is entirely right in this].

“It’s evident that it’s not an in-depth and serious use of documents,” he said [that's certainly true]. Earlier Friday, Father Lombardi suggested that the pope would be willing to meet with sexual abuse victims.

But John S. Cummins, the former bishop of Oakland who repeatedly wrote his superiors in Rome urging that the priest be defrocked [but it seems he kept writing to the wrong office; it he was serious about his urging there isn't much too show for it], said the Vatican in that era, after the Second Vatican Council, was especially reluctant to dismiss priests because so many were abandoning the priesthood.

As a result, he said, Pope John Paul II “really slowed down the process and made it much more deliberate.”

The letters and memos, released to The New York Times by Jeff Anderson, a co-counsel representing some of the priests’ victims [who obviously has a financial stake in these clearly false allegations], reveal a rising level of exasperation among church officials in Oakland about the delays from the Vatican.

Bishop Cummins wrote to Cardinal Ratzinger in February 1982: “It is my conviction that there would be no scandal if this petition were granted [I find this assertion impossible to accept] and that as a matter of fact, given the nature of the case, there might be greater scandal to the community if Father Kiesle were allowed to return to the active ministry [with this I agree, but this decision belonged not to Cardinal Ratzinger but to Bishop Cummins himself. Why would the bishop not accept this responsibility?].”

In late 1981 Cardinal Ratzinger had just been appointed to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the church’s doctrinal office [which was not responsible for such cases until 2001]. This office was supposed to handle abuse cases only when they were considered violations of the sacrament of Confession [which doesn't seem to be the case with Kiesle], before the policies were clarified in 2001 and the doctrinal office took on all the abuse cases [so...if Goodstein knows this, how can she make the claims about Ratzinger she does with any sense of journalistic integrity but less simple decency?]. (It is unclear why the doctrinal office was handling the case of Mr. Kiesle in the 1980s) [What evidence is there that the CDF was handling the case? All that has been brought forth as "evidence" is a couple of letters that seem to be more advisory than anything else].

Bishop Cummins had first petitioned the doctrinal office to defrock Mr. Kiesle in 1981. He also wrote directly to Pope John Paul II. Cardinal Ratzinger requested more information, which officials in the Oakland Diocese supplied in February 1982. They did not hear back from Cardinal Ratzinger until 1985, when he sent the letter in Latin suggesting that his office needed more time to evaluate the case.

The Rev. George Mockel, a diocesan official in Oakland, wrote in a memo to Bishop Cummins: “Basically they are going to sit on it until Steve gets quite a bit older. My own feeling is that this is unfortunate.”

Mr. Kiesle was finally defrocked in 1987 [this is not an accurage term, and certainly not a canonical one].

Mr. Kiesle was convicted for the first time of child molesting in 1978, just six years after he was ordained [and three years before the case was apparently brought before Cardinal Ratzinger, reasons for which are still not certain. Again, how serious was Bishop Cummins in requesting Kiesle's laicization? Why has Goodstein not written an article castigating Bishop Cummins for "putting off" punishing an abusive priest?]. He pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor charge of lewd conduct while he was a pastor at Our Lady of the Rosary in Union City, Calif.

Mike Brown, a spokesman for the Oakland Diocese, said that after Mr. Kiesle was convicted, the diocese withdrew permission for him to work as a minister [so...he was removed from ministry three years before the petition for laicization?]. Mr. Kiesle served three years’ probation for his misdemeanor and underwent treatment, enabling him to eventually get his record wiped clean [where is the outrage at civil authorities for this?].

In 1985, while the bishop in Oakland was pressing Cardinal Ratzinger to defrock Mr. Kiesle, the priest [who had been removed from ministry seven years earlier] began volunteering in the youth ministry at one of his former parishes [this would be the fault of dreadful oversight - or really lack thereof - on the part of the Diocese and would have nothing to do with the CDF], St. Joseph’s in Pinole, Calif., news reports say.

Maurine Behrend, a former employee in the diocese’s youth ministry office, recalled encountering Mr. Kiesle at a Youth Day in April 1988 and learning from another minister that Mr. Kiesle had been convicted of molestation. Ms. Behrend alerted the head of the youth ministry office and personally warned Bishop Cummins two weeks later.

In May 1988, she wrote an outraged letter to a church official, demanding to know why “a convicted church molester is currently the youth ministry coordinator at St. Joseph’s parish in Pinole.”

Bishop Cummins, who is now 82, contested news reports that Mr. Kiesle was volunteering at his old parish for three years, saying diocesan officials would have heard and acted earlier [yet they waited three years to write to Rome? Something doesn't quite add up]. Bishop Cummins did not recall ever being alerted, despite Ms. Behrend’s irate letter.

Bishop Cummins said Mr. Kiesle was finally removed from his volunteer position when the bishop happened to bump into him at a child’s confirmation ceremony at the parish. The next day, the bishop said he made sure Mr. Kiesle was banned from working at the parish.

In 2002, Mr. Kiesle was charged in several cases of molestation, including abusing at least a half-dozen young girls while at his former parishes in the 1960s and 1970s. But those charges had to be dropped when the United States Supreme Court struck down a California law that extended the statute of limitations on child molestation cases [again, where the outrage against civil authorities?].

He eventually pleaded no contest in 2004 to a separate felony charge of molesting a child at his vacation home in Truckee, Calif., in 1995 and was sentenced to six years in prison.

Rick Simons, an attorney in Hayward, Calif., who represented two of the victims who later sued the Diocese of Oakland, said he met Father Kiesle when he took his deposition in prison.

“Of all the priests who abused children that I have met, and there’s probably a couple dozen, he was by far the most evil, remorseless sociopath of the lot,” he said.

Mr. Kiesle was released, and is listed in California’s sex offenders registry as living in Walnut Creek, Ca. He lives in a gated community, where guards on Friday prevented a reporter from approaching his home.

Mr. Simons said that about eight victims of Mr. Kiesle reached a settlement with the Diocese of Oakland in 2005, and that on average each received about $1 million to $1.5 million.