Priesthood Has ‘No Place’ for Abusers, Pope Declares

ROME —  Pope John Paul II, in a ringing denunciation of sexual abuse, declared Tuesday that there is no place in the Roman Catholic priesthood for those who molest the young.

Speaking to an extraordinary meeting of cardinals summoned from the United States in the wake of the clerical sex scandal rocking the American church, John Paul called the abuse of minors both a civil crime and “an appalling sin.”

The pope’s emphatic statement, several cardinals said later, was an unmistakable signal that he expects bishops to cooperate fully with law enforcement authorities in ferreting out offending priests.

But he offered no explicit guidance on whether the church should enforce a “one-strike” rule to defrock any priest found to have molested a minor. Some cardinals, meeting at the Vatican to set guidelines to handle sex offenses, said the pope’s nuanced statement was open to interpretation.

Shifting from the defensive tone of his recent remarks, which had agonized over the scandal’s demoralizing blow to the church and its clergy, John Paul sounded a note of compassion for the victims of sexual abuse. Since January, dozens of American priests have been accused of sex crimes, and bishops have been faulted for covering up some of the incidents.

“To the victims and their families, wherever they may be, I express my profound sense of solidarity and concern,” John Paul said in remarks to the cardinals that were later released by the Vatican. The actions of abusive priests, he said, have caused “suffering and scandal to the young” and undermined trust in the church.

“People need to know that there is no place in the priesthood and religious life for those who would harm the young,” the pope told the 12 U.S. cardinals, two U.S. bishops and leading Vatican cardinals. “They must know that bishops and priests are totally committed to the fullness of Catholic truth on matters of sexual morality.”

But John Paul, who believes in the transformative power of religious experiences, also raised the possibility of a changed life for a repentant fallen priest.

“We cannot forget the power of Christian conversion, that radical decision to turn away from sin and back to God,” he said.

Whether a priest undergoing such a “conversion” would be allowed to remain a priest remained open to question.

“This isn’t clear to me either,” Cardinal Francis George of Chicago told reporters. “So I’m not sure where that [papal] discourse leads us on that question of ‘zero tolerance.’ ” Even the U.S. delegation, George said, was not in agreement on that issue.

“There is a difference between a moral monster who preys upon little children, who does so in serial fashion, and someone who perhaps under the influence of alcohol engages in an action with a 17- or 16-year-old young woman who returns his affections,” George told reporters.

Cardinal Roger M. Mahony of Los Angeles said it was evident to him from the pope’s remarks that the church has a dual role--to protect and help the victim, and to help the perpetrator.

“What he [John Paul] really was saying is you must take the person who is the abuser or the molester and work with them. That doesn’t mean you reassign them to the priesthood,” Mahony said.

Bishop Wilton D. Gregory, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said the reassignment of abusive priests remained “a thorny issue.”

Credibility Concerns

One thing was clear: Cardinals and bishops who weeks ago avoided public discussion of the growing scandal are now eager to pose as articulate reformers. Public relations representatives for the U.S. bishops conference were flown here from Washington to arrange daily media briefings, and several cardinals spoke to reporters on their own.

“Obviously, the question of the credibility of bishops is a real concern,” Gregory said. “We’ve passed the time for mea culpas. We’re in the season for action.”

David Clohessy of St. Louis, director of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, said, “The real test of whether or not there will be serious reform will come long after the media spotlight and legal pressure abates.”

At first ignored by the Vatican, the scandals have threatened to taint John Paul’s long papacy, casting him in his twilight years as an enfeebled pontiff distant from the problems afflicting his church and overly protective of his clergy.

But his forceful speech Tuesday dispelled that image.

In one elegant passage, the pope gave thanks for good works by the “vast majority” of American priests, who are free of scandal, and offered a judgment of the American church that might also fit his own reign: “A great work of art may be blemished, but its beauty remains.”

“We must be confident that this time of trial will bring a purification of the entire Catholic community,” John Paul said. “So much pain, so much sorrow must lead to a holier priesthood, a holier episcopate and a holier church.”

“That line hit me,” said Cardinal Adam Maida of Detroit. “That’s the challenge.”

Several cardinals offered to restore credibility by creating advisory councils in each diocese to help bishops handle sexual abuse cases. They also were studying the idea of creating a national layperson’s panel to advise the U.S. bishops conference on the issue.

The worst crisis in the American church’s modern history ignited in January in Boston with the disclosure that a known pedophile priest had been moved by the Boston archdiocese from parish to parish. Other cases followed, and the scandal soon spread to dioceses across the country.

Catholic bishops have come under intense pressure to act. Outraged Catholics have called for the resignations of Cardinals Bernard Law of Boston and Edward M. Egan of New York, both blamed for reassigning abusive priests to new parishes without telling parishioners.

In the last two days, some cardinals have told the pope’s closest confidants that the Vatican should ask for Law’s resignation as archbishop of Boston, one cardinal told The Times. A bishop confirmed the cardinal’s account. Both asked that they not be identified. Both said a majority of American bishops want Law to step down quickly.

But on Tuesday, Maida joined George and Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick of Washington in saying that Law should remain. “The trouble began on his watch, and he wants to fix it,” McCarrick said. “Give him a chance.”

The pope made no reference to the pressures on Law. But he said Tuesday that “many are offended at the way in which the church’s leaders are perceived to have acted in this matter.”

Law Offers Apology

Meeting with his fellow U.S. cardinals Monday night, Law personally apologized to them, but no one spoke of resignation, George told reporters. Law, he said, “started out saying that in a sense, if he had not made some terrible mistakes, we probably would not be here.”

The formal, high-powered encounter--between the American prelates and nine senior Vatican officials--took place around a U-shaped conference table in the frescoed Sala Bologna of the Apostolic Palace.

All eight cardinals who lead U.S. archdioceses were present: Law, Maida, Egan, George, McCarrick, Mahony, William Keeler of Baltimore and Anthony Bevilacqua of Philadelphia.

They were joined by Cardinal Avery Dulles, a New York theologian, and three American cardinals who work in the Vatican: William Wakefield Baum, Edmund Szoka and James Francis Stafford.

For 5 1/2 hours Tuesday, the American prelates rose one by one to diagnose the problem and to offer solutions.

The Americans’ immediate goal is to win Vatican authorization for the U.S. bishops conference to impose unprecedented binding procedures on all 195 U.S. diocesan bishops for addressing clerical sex abuse. The conference is to meet in Dallas in June.

Some American cardinals were also demanding a strong statement from the pope.

It came just before their midday break, after the prelates had filed from the meeting hall through a labyrinth of corridors to the papal library. John Paul, who did not attend the discussions, greeted each one.

“He was very cordial, very grateful,” Maida said, “but I could just see in his face and his being: He was very sorry that we were there to discuss this particular situation.”

Then he sat to read his remarks in English, while his guests followed like schoolboys from a prepared text.

John Paul said he was “deeply grieved” by the scandal and asked God to give the bishops the strength to deal with it. He asked Catholics to “stay close to their priests and bishops” and predicted that “your discussions here will bear much fruit.”

His remarks, some cardinals said, recast what the Vatican had viewed as an “American problem” into a challenge for the worldwide church, which has suffered less visible clerical sex scandals in Canada, Australia, Ireland, Britain, France, Germany, Mexico and Poland.

“Americans aren’t the only ones who sin,” George told reporters. “The holy father certainly knows the problem exists elsewhere. . . . Perhaps what we do here can be helpful to the universal church.”

Much of the first day’s discussion, however, was inconclusive and skirted issues of clerical celibacy and homosexuality that some leading Catholics insist are central to the debate.

Mahony had called previously for debate on whether a married priesthood would reduce instances of clerical sex abuse. But he did not press the issue Tuesday, and other cardinals brought up celibacy only to ask how the centuries-old clerical tradition could be strengthened.

Another issue put on the table, but unresolved, is whether homosexuals should be excluded from the priesthood--an idea suggested recently by the pope’s spokesman, Joaquin Navarro-Valls. Maida said Tuesday that “behavioral scientists are telling us” that clerical sex abuse is “a homosexual problem.”

In unusually candid remarks to reporters, Gregory admitted that a “homosexual dynamic” exists in some American seminaries and discourages young men from studying for the priesthood. “It is an ongoing struggle,” he said, “to make sure that the Catholic priesthood is not dominated by homosexual men.”

The American cardinals worked into the night to shape the day’s discussion into proposals that might find consensus today.