References cont. (43) — Clergy Child Molesters

   Inside the Vatican, by Thomas A. Szyskiewicz, p 32-34, October 2003
   Following the scandals in the Church in 2002, many lay people are seeking more effective episcopal leadership. Who are these people, and what are their aims?
   Was it a "secret" meeting, or merely a "private" one? Was it the fruit of a "conspiracy," or just an innocuous get-together blown out of proportion?
   The answer isn't clear. Was is clear is that many people are on "hair-trigger alert" when it comes to efforts to sway the direction of Church doctrine and practice – including us at Inside the Vatican. But first, the facts.
   On July 7, 34 people, most of them laymen and laywomen, met with five US Catholic bishops for an entire day at the John Paul II Cultural Center in Washington, D.C. The meeting was unannounced and not open to the public.
   Then, on September 8, 40 people gathered at a club in Washington for another, different meeting, seemingly convened in response to the first. Again, most of those present were laymen and laywomen, and the same five bishops attended as at the first meeting. This meeting was announced, but not open to the public. (The editor of Inside the Vatican asked if he might attend, and was told he could not.)
   The first meeting was "confidential" – until the Boston Globe heard about it and placed it on page 1 of their July 11 edition. The second meeting was publicized and a press conference was held afterwards. It even got write-ups in The Washington Post and Catholic News Service, and one of the speakers wrote an opinion column on it in The Wall Street Journal.
   The things which most drew people's attention to the first meeting were the topic and the list of attendees. The topic was The Church in America: The Way Forward in the 21st Century. And the attendees read like a Who's Who list of the so-called "progressive element" of the Church: Monika Hellwig, feminist theologian and president of the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities; Father Bryan Hehir, former Harvard Divinity School professor and current director of Catholic Charities USA; Peter and Margaret Steinfels, respectively a New York Times religion columnist and the editor of Commonweal magazine; Father Thomas Reese, S.J., editor of America magazine; R. Scott Appleby, professor of history at Noire Dame; Father Edward Malloy, CSC, president of Notre Dame; James Davidson, sociologist at Purdue University and frequent writer in the Catholic press; and Father Donald Monan, S.J., chancellor of Boston College.
   Others who attended from outside ecclesiastical circles were Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, former lieutenant governor of Maryland; John Sweeney, president of the AFL-CIO; Frederick Gluck, former managing director of McKinsey and Co., a major management consulting firm; Cokie Roberts, news commentator at ABC News and National Public Radio and daughter of former U.S. President Bill Clinton's ambassador to the Vatican, Lindy Boggs; and Mary Jo Bane, professor at the Kennedy School of Government, former Clinton administration appointee and a member of the group "Voice of the Faithful."
   There were also lesser-known figures like Michael Collins, CEO of Caritas Christi Health Care in Boston; Mary Jane England, president of Regis College, a Catholic women's college in Boston, which will be sponsoring a conference on women in the Church with Father Donald Cozzens; Sister Joan Chittister and the Steinfels; Sister Mary Johnson, SND, a professor of sociology at Emmanuel College in Boston; Robert Popeo, the president of a law firm in Boston; and Francis Butler, director of Foundations and Donors Interested in Catholic Activities (FADICA) in Washington.
   The four bishops present were notable, not because of their individual dioceses, but because of the positions they hold or held on the national level: Bishop Wilton Gregory of Belleville, Ill., president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops; Bishop William Skylstad of Spokane, Wash., USCCB vice-president; Bishop William Friend of Shreveport, La., secretary of the USCCB; and Bishop Robert Lynch of St. Petersburg, Fla., a former general secretary of the then-National Conference of Catholic Bishops.
   One other USCCB official present was Kathleen McChesney, the former FBI agent who is now the head of the Office for Child and Youth Protection at the USCCB.
   Finally, a prince of the Church was there: Theodore Cardinal McCarrick, Archbishop of Washington, whom the Boston Globe identified as the host of the meeting since it was in his diocese. (The cardinal has repudiated that statement.)
   Inside the Vatican made calls to many participants, but, like other journals who tried to cover this story, received calls back from very few, and the calls that were returned were either "off-the-record" or on deep background.
   "I can't tell you much," said Father Reese, "because that was the agreement we had in meeting. It was a group of lay people who got together to meet with the bishops and talk about the sex abuse crisis and the future of the Church," the Jesuit continued. "It was held in a public place and there was no attempt to hide it. It was an off-the-record meeting. It allowed for a free exchange of views which is difficult with media pressure."
   All the people Inside the Vatican was able to contact insisted that the meeting was not "secret," but merely private and confidential – as most meetings bishops have are, they observed. A spokeswoman for the archdiocese of Washington, who confirmed that Cardinal McCarrick was present at the gathering, said she could not comment on it because it was a private, confidential meeting. The spokeswoman also said the cardinal had nothing to do with its organization.
   Msgr. Francis Mansicalco, director of communications for the USCCB, insisted that this was not a conference-related meeting, but a meeting organized by laity with the bishops present acting as bishops of their own dioceses, not as USCCB officers.
   "The essential point is that the bishops were invited to a meeting arranged by others," he said. "They did not call for it, plan it, choose the participants, or in any other way engage in organizing it. Essentially they were guests of the organizers, and they expected to hear the comments and advice chiefly of executives and management experts.
   "When asked to choose a few bishops out of the entire Conference, it is logical to think first of all of the officers. But the bishops were told, when invited, and the attendees were told at the meeting, that the bishops were there as individuals and not representing the Conference. This is not a difficult distinction to make. All bishops – even Conference officers – are first of all bishops of their own dioceses and generally speak from that perspective."
WHAT HAPPENED AT THE MEETING
   The meeting, according to one source, lasted from 8:30 a.m. until 6:00 p.m. It was divided into five sections with two speakers each given about 12 minutes to talk about a specific subject. First were Davidson of Purdue and Appleby of Notre Dame talking about where the Church is in this moment of history. Next came Peter Steinfels talking about the laity, and lawyer Popeo, talking about what was happening in Boston. Then Bane of Harvard and Butler of FADICA talked over lunch about communications; Father Reese then talked about finances and Gluck talked about management; and in the final section Margaret Steinfels talked about governance and Father Monan about accountability.
   After each section, there was a break-out session to discuss in smaller groups what was brought up in the talks.
   What exactly was said in these talks and in the breakout sessions is primarily a matter of speculation since no one is talking. Some have said that there was some discussion of women priests and married priests, but that it was not discussed except in passing and only in the breakout sessions.
   There was also some talk about the bishops' proposed "plenary council," though what was said is unknown.
  [Picture] Above left, Bishop Wilton Gregory, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, attended both secret meetings (CNS photo by Bob Roller).  Above right, Boston Cardinal Bernard Law, who resigned December 13 following a year-long scandal over priestly misconduct cases (CNS photo from Reuters).  Below left, Deal Hudson, and center, Russell Shaw, during a press conference on September 8 in Washington.  They and other Catholic lay and religious leaders had met earlier with several US bishops to stress the role of bishops in defining and defending Church teaching (CNS photo by Martin Lueders).  Below right, Peter Steinfels addressing an academic convocation at Providence College in Providence, R.I., on September 10.  He attended the first secret meeting (CNS photo by Hank Randall, Providence Visitor)
   In 2002, after the USCCB meeting in June in Dallas, eight bishops, under the leadership of Bishop Alien Vigneron, then an auxiliary of Detroit and now the coadjutor of Oakland, proposed a "plenary council" to get to the root of the sex abuse crisis. The proposal has gained steam, but has also run into opposition.
   What did not happen, according to participants, may be as important as what did happen. There was no consensus and no promises were made, one said. It was an opportunity for an exchange of views with prominent lay Catholics.
THE ORGANIZER OF MEETING #1
   The first meeting was organized by Geoffrey Boisi, a high-powered New York banker. Boisi is a graduate of Boston College, a former trustee of that school, former vice-chairman of JP Morgan Chase, a member of the Trilateral Commission, a Knight of Malta, and a board member of the Papal Foundation. Little else is known about Boisi, his sympathies or connections. He spoke to ITV, but had only this to say for the record: "There's a difference between a private and confidential meeting and a secret one. This [meeting] was in no way intended to be a skewed conversation about it [the crisis]. I'm concerned there's been a misunderstanding of what was intended. It [the meeting] was more of a practical nature than a theological one."
THE REACTION
   The reaction to the meeting from orthodox thinkers ranged from curiosity as to why this meeting would be so "hush-hush" to outright anger.
   Father Richard Neuhaus, editor of First Things, said he found it interesting that the organizers completely ignored the Pope. "We have somebody of some consequence in Rome who for the last 25 years has been laying out a program of renewal for the Church, namely Pope John Paul," he said. "It is very strange at a meeting on that subject, that, as far as I know, there was nobody there who was his champion."
   There was also befuddlement that this "secret" or "private and confidential" meeting was held by people who have been calling for the Church to have greater transparency and accountability. It is a little humorous that the proponents of a more open Church should decide to meet in this way, said Father Neuhaus.
   Indeed, the National Catholic Register quoted Harvard's Mary Jo Bane from an article she wrote for Commonweal in March 2002. "One of the devastating aspects of the [sex abuse] disclosures," Bane said, "has been the documentation of the closed, secret and self-protecting nature of the decisions made by the hierarchy. The documents reveal a culture of secrecy and deference in which the top decision-maker is surrounded by aides who seem to be more concerned with protecting their reputations and that of their allies than with the mission of the organization or the welfare of those it serves. They attempt to control information, prevent public disclosure and silence dissent, even, in this case, the anguished cries of abused children and their families." Yet, the article continues, "when asked about the July 7 meeting, she responded it was organized 'with the understanding that we'd keep the proceedings confidential, and I feel I owe it to the organizer to do that.'"
   Helen Hull Hitchcock, editor of the Adoremus Bulletin, called it very discouraging. "Where were Father Neuhaus and George Weigel?" she asked.
   There was talk at the meeting about holding another meeting with a wider participation, presumably with people like Weigel and Father Neuhaus; however, nothing was made firm.
   The strongest response came from Deal Hudson, editor of Crisis magazine. The day the Boston Globe reported the incident, he sent an e-mail to his newsletter list which pulled no punches. Talking about the participants he said, "As for the others – well, they're prominent all right. The list is full of the kinds of liberal and dissident Catholics that would make a Call To Action conference jealous."
   And, "If these people are representative of those invited to the conference, I think it's safe to say that the real criterion for involvement was not prominence or influence in the Catholic Church but sympathy with dissenting points of view."
   Hudson gave vent to questions a lot of people had, including why there were so many people from Boston there, why high-ranking bishops would meet with such known liberals and dissenters (and do it in private), why "there isn't a single person on the list known for his or her stand in support of faithfulness to the Magisterium, the Pope, and the teachings of the Church... Apparently, those Catholics faithful to the Church don't count."
THE SECOND MEETING
   Apparently Hudson was wrong, because he soon was able to arrange a meeting with the same group of bishops.
   This second meeting lacked much of the intrigue of the first because it was well-publicized. The list of participants, the topic ("A Meeting in Support of the Church"), where it would be held, were all known and sent out by e-mail beforehand to Crisis newsletter recipients. After the meeting, a press conference revealed what had been discussed.
   Hudson organized the meeting along with Russell Shaw, a former spokesman for the US bishops. The participants could talk about the meeting on one simple condition: the individual participant could only directly quote what that individual participant said and no one else.
   Peggy Noonan wrote a column in the Wall Street Journal about it. Hudson, of course, made it the subject of his Crisis e-mail newsletter. Tom Hoopes, executive editor of the National Catholic Register, and Greg Erlandson, publisher of Our Sunday Visitor, both discussed it in their respective papers.
   In fact, 13 of the 40 non-USCCB participants were members of the media, either secular or Catholic. The next largest group (nine) came from Church-affiliated groups, eight from education and five each from business and politics. This openness surprised one participant from the first meeting. Father Reese said he was a bit taken aback by the press conference that was held after the second meeting. "They must have had different ground rules for that meeting than we did," he said.
   That fact was confirmed by Msgr. Mansicalco, who told Inside the Vatican that the rules for each meeting were set by the invitors.
   But this second meeting was not without its detractors. Deacon Keith Fournier, an attorney and president of Your Catholic Voice Foundation, posted on his website and mailed an e-mail of complaint to Hudson (he took the text down from his site shortly after it went up). Fournier and his associate, former Boston mayor and US ambassador to the Holy See Ray Flynn, were not invited to the meeting. Fournier became convinced it was because he and Flynn, while sharing with Hudson a commitment to the Magisterium, do not share Hudson's (Republican) political views.
   That is not surprising, since Flynn is a life-long Democrat and Fournier describes himself as a reluctant Republican, while Hudson is an advisor to the Bush White House and Noonan was President Ronald Reagan's speechwriter. (Hudson told Fournier in a brief e-mail that his political affiliation was not the reason he was not invited.)
   But other problems remain unexplained or unresolved. Michael Sirillo, a theology professor at Franciscan University of Steubenville, believes these types of meetings could be misinterpreted as having partisan or political overtones, though it may not have been that partisan to the bishops who attended them. He noted that, through the centuries, there have been different ways of exercising episcopal leadership. For instance, in the late 15th and early 16th centuries, there was a move led by William of Ockham to have far more lay involvement in the government of the Church, a move backed by many bishops.
   Sirillo, though, looked at the spiritual elements that seemed to be missing from both sides of the argument. "The character a bishop receives at his ordination," Sirillo said, "is a metaphysical reality that gives him the ability to govern, teach and sanctify." While a bishop has the grace given by the Holy Spirit, he still has free will to mess it up, just as we all do, Sirillo commented. "God doesn't always give us the bishops we need, but He does give us the bishops we deserve," he quipped. But Sirillo also noted that acts of repentance have always changed things around for God's flock, from the time of the kings of Israel onward. "Moral turpitude lands us with bad kings and bad priests," he said. "There is a very practical connection between doing works of penance and having good bishops."
   That reality gives hope for the future of the Church.
   Thomas A. Szyszkiewicz is the former editor of The Catholic Times in La Crosse, Wisconsin.  His work appears regularly in national and international Catholic publications.  He writes from Altura, Minnesota, USA.