From the NY Times of 8 Mar 2011:
Quote:
21 Priests Suspended in Philadelphia
The mass suspension was the single-most sweeping in the history of the sexual-abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Church in the United States, said Terence McKiernan, president of BishopAccountability.org, which archives documents from the abuse scandal in dioceses across the country.
The archdiocese’s action follows a damning grand jury report issued Feb. 10 that accused the archdiocese of a widespread cover-up of predatory priests, stretching over decades, and said that as many as 37 priests remained active in the ministry despite credible accusations against them. ...
Nor did it name the 21 whom it suspended, drawing the fury of groups representing abuse victims. Many parishioners are likely to learn that their priest was accused when he fails to appear for Ash Wednesday services.
The announcement was a major embarrassment for Cardinal Justin Rigali, who, in response to the grand jury report, had initially said there were no priests in active ministry "who have an admitted or established allegation of sexual abuse of a minor against them." ...
"We may have to be asking, what did the cardinal know and when did he know it?” said Leonard Norman Primiano, a Roman Catholic and chairman of the religious studies department at Cabrini College in nearby Radnor, Pa. He described the mass suspension as “astonishing."
At a minimum, the scope of the suspensions underscored the grand jury's contention that the archdiocese had failed to clean house after a grand jury report in 2005 found credible accusations of abuse by 63 priests. And it suggested that potentially, predatory priests had had access to thousands of children for years.
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Philadelphia is one of few jurisdictions that decided to investigate. And found widespread pedophilia combined with possible coverup by three Cardinals. That for only one archdiocese. Philly region and multiple more archdioceses. Are the others innocent? Of course not. But most prosecutors do not have the balls to go after reason for most corruption. Its not a question of pedophilia in your region. The question is how many and why are your prosecutors not investigating an organization where the crime was either covered up or ignored at the highest levels probably everywhere.
Knowing that pedophilia still exists, the Cardinal insisted it did not. Then had to stop the coverup when a more honest institution - the government - forced then to be honest.
How major is this story? Even Fox News on 8 Mar 2011 reported it for the first time. Well, the Fox article was as short as possible - only 7 paragraphs. And without any mention of the other Grand Jury report that Fox had completely ignored.
If 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management, then what does that say about god? God and Fox would pretend it does not exist?