Timothy Dolan, the top priest in the Roman Catholic Church in the United States, broke his silence yesterday on the matter of accusations that he paid off Roman Catholic priests who sexually abused children. He spoke to the New York Post.
"The New York Times does not have a reputation for fair and accurate reporting when it comes to this issue," Dolan said yesterday after Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral in Midtown. "So, to respond to charges like that -- that are groundless and scurrilous -- in my book it's useless and counterproductive."Dolan denies that he is currently paying pedophile priests in New York to go away. Which is good. (But was he thus accused?) He did not deny paying ordained pedophiles priests $20,000 to disappear while heading the Milwaukee Archdiocese. And here's the good part:
Yesterday, Dolan denied that similar payments were being made in the New York Archdiocese, which includes about 400 parishes in Manhattan, The Bronx, Staten Island, and seven suburban counties.
“No, thank God. Cardinal Egan did a splendid job — that’s all taken care of,” said Dolan, referring to his predecessor, Edward Cardinal Egan.Cardinal Egan did a splendid job. (I got two words for you, Father Tim: "Bridgeport" and "Connecticut.")
So, the New York Times reported that Dolan paid off priests employed by the diocese while he was cardinal of Milwaukee, but Cardinal Dolan refuses to comment on these claims, because the suggestion that he did things he admits to doing is scurrilous and groundless.
Okayyyy... Cardinal Queeg.
I have a bias when it comes to the New York Times: I wish Maureen Dowd were pope. I've also written about the church for the Times. I feel that the New York Times is exceedingly careful with covering the Roman Catholic Church.
Possibly too careful.
Roman Catholic news is not just religion news. In the United States, the Holy See aims to reverse Roe V. Wade and pass the Defense of Marriage Act. The Roman Catholic Orthodox fringe, which has a disturbingly anti-Semitic focus, is gaining ground Western Europe. Ireland's Cloyne Report landed the Vatican is on Amnesty International's Watch List for Violating the Human Rights of children. The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) submitted 22,000 pages of documentation, this past September, to the International Criminal Courts as part of complaint against the Vatican on the charge of systematic child abuse. CCR never expected to win the battle to have this case heard overnight, but as they wait, they develop the case against the Vatican. I suppose it's possible that the Vatican sexual abuse scandal might be limited to Ireland and the United States, but this seems unlikely. We will soon know whether rumors of widespread abuse in Asian and African nations wherein the church is growing are true. I'm not sure we have even seen the tip of he Vatican child-torturing iceberg.
Pushing brutal tyrants up against the wall and demanding answers of them -- that's what newspapers are for. The New York Times should be pressing the bishops for answers.
Timothy Dolan accuses the New York Times of lying even though he doesn't dispute their facts.
And that's all he has to say? That's it? He paid off men who violated children, instead of turning them into the police, so that they could go forth and rape again, and he feels no obligation whatsoever to address it?
No. Dolan appears to feel he has a god-given right to this conduct. He's finished talking.
I'm starting to think that anyone who puts a nickel in a Cardinal Dolan's New York Archdiocese collection basket deserves him.
This man is holy?
Guilty as sin is more like it.
And now he's off to Tipperary. He better watch his back. I hear the Catholics over there are standing up to the pimps.
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