Category: Church & State

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Bishop vs. Bishop: Lutheran calls out Catholic over marriage

The retired presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Rt. Rev. Herbert Chilstrom, has delivered a stinging, public critique of his former Roman Catholic counterpart in Minnesota for aggressively campaigning for an anti-same sex marriage amendment on the November ballot.

“I recognize your authority in formulating positions for your own flock in Minnesota: That is one thing,” Chilstrom said in a letter to Roman Catholic Archbishop John Nienstedt, published in the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

“But for you and others to campaign for an amendment that imposes your stance on all citizens in Minnesota — including other Christians, believers of other faith groups and unbelievers — it is overstepping your bounds.”

Minnesota is one of four states voting on marriage this November. Washington, Maryland and Maine will cast ballots on whether to approve marriage equality. In Minnesota, Nienstedt has put $650,000 in church money into promoting the state constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage.

Nienstedt has gone far beyond church leaders in Washington, where Seattle Archbishop J. Peter Sartain allowed parishes to opt out of signature gathering for Referendum 74.

Nienstedt told St. Paul-Minneapolis archdiocesan clergy that he would permit no “open dissension.” As the Star Tribune reported last week, “He wrote one outspoken priest, the Rev. Mike Tegeder, that if he persisted, ‘I . . . will remove you from your ministerial assignments’.”

Nienstedt is also notorious for responding to a Catholic mother’s plea that her gay son be accepted, “I urge you to reconsider the position that you expressed . . . Your eternal salvation may well depend upon a conversion of heart on this topic.”

Asked by the Star Tribune whether a loyal Catholic could vote No, Nienstedt said: “It would be difficult to comprehend how a person could not believe that marriage is anything but a union between one man and one woman. On this point, Catholic teaching is clear.”

Still, more than 80 former Catholic priests have signed a letter denouncing the amendment, and three retired Catholic priests have urged its defeat. Laity have placed “Another Catholic voting No” signs on their lawns. (Taking a cue from Minnesota, 63 former priests in the Seattle Archdiocese have endorsed marriage equality.)

“By word and action, you leave the impression that there is little room for dissent in your church,” Chilstrom wrote to Nienstedt. He cited the example of a former Catholic bishop in Minnesota, the Rt. Rev. Raymond Lucker, who questioned the church’s prohibition against married priests.

The Lutheran Bishop noted that in his denomination, “we engage in a wide spectrum of clergy and laity in developing statements and guidelines in our thinking about complex social issues.” If member disagree with stands taken in the church’s national assembly, the right of conscience is recognized.

“If there were a call from Roman Catholic members in Minnesota to vote on an issue of significance, would you allow such a vote?” Chilstrom asked Nienstedt. “And if a simple majority voted in favor, would you accept that vote as final? It’s clear that such a vote would not even be permitted in your church.

“There is evidence that many in your church will vote No on this amendment. I stand with them and with all who will vote No.”

Complete Article HERE!

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Catholic Church errs in fighting same-sex marriage

There’s a delicious rebellion brewing in Washington state — the “other Washington,” as those of us based in D.C. like to say.

A group of 63 former Roman Catholic priests, with a total of 800 years service, supports Referendum 74, a ballot initiative that would make Washington the seventh state in the nation to legalize marriage between same-sex couples. The announcement of their support is designed to combat a church campaign against the measure that the San Francisco Chronicle describes as “aggressive.”

The church is issuing pastoral statements and releasing videos urging parishioners to vote against marriage equality.

Here’s a sampling:

— Bishop Joseph J. Tyson of the Diocese of Yakima, Wash., told his 41 parishes: “Once marriage is redefined as a genderless contract, it will become legally discriminatory for public and private institutions such as schools to promote the unique meaning of marriage. … This law will challenge our right to educate about the unique value of children being raised by his or her own mother and father in a stable home (sic).”

I understand why the church is undertaking an extensive political campaign against gay marriage. There’s no doubt that gay marriage goes against the very biased doctrinal interpretation of homosexuality often cited in the New Testament.

But if members of the Catholic hierarchy are worried about losing followers to other Christian churches, or want to capture the hearts of the next generation of Catholics, they’ll give up the fight.

It’s clear that young Americans of all faiths have been raised in a cultural environment that views LGBTQ couples as no different than heterosexual couples. The bishops are picking a fight over an issue they are not going to win.

The Chronicle sites a recent Elway Poll that pegged support for Referendum 74 at 57 percent. Gov. Christine Gregoire, a Democrat and an outspoken proponent for it, championed same-sex marriage legislation through the state chambers.

Similar measures are on the ballot in Maryland and Maine.

The church is taking on not just Catholic voters in those states or, one could posit, in the United States — Gallup poll last May on gay marriage showed half of Americans support it.

Ireland’s former president, Mary McAleese, this week told Irish state broadcaster RTE she supports gay marriage. Her views on social issues have drawn the ire of many an archbishop, including the former Archbishop of Boston Bernard Law, who called her “a very poor Catholic president.”

Her response: “I am not a Catholic president, I’m president of Ireland,” where “there were all sorts of people. I’m their president. I happen to be Catholic.”

It seems unwise for the church to take on such powerful politicians and social movements that are gaining mainstream support. The timing is particularly unwise when one takes into account how the church’s handling of the priest pedophilia scandal cost it credibility.

I am in awe of the gay rights movement’s progress on this issue. It seems LGBTQ leaders have been able to turn around public opinion on marriage equality in less than a decade. Too bad their sisters in the abortion-rights movement have not been as successful. Abortion is one topic on which the church, sadly, can keep up a successful crusade. But the church undoubtedly has a dwindling supply of social issues in its arsenal.

Complete Article HERE!

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A Gay Wedding in Rome

Though it’s still not legal, the home base of the Catholic Church hosted its first known same-sex marriage today. Barbie Latza Nadeau on the new push for civil rights in Italy.

Gay marriage is not legal in Italy, but that hasn’t stopped a number of same-sex couples from tying the knot.

On a rainy Sunday afternoon in the historic All Saint’s Anglican Church near Rome’s Piazza del Popolo, Francesco and Alessandro made their vows of marriage in the presence of friends and family. One groom wore a blue suit; the other a white one. A flower girl dressed in pink and a young ring bearer accompanied the couple, who both smiled and cried tears of happiness like thousands of other newlyweds.

 

The one-hour ceremony included communion, scripture readings, and lively spiritual music by a visiting choir invited to help celebrate the first same-sex marriage known to be held in Rome, the base of the Roman Catholic Church. The grooms held hands and exchanged rings that had been blessed by Mother Teodora Tosatti, the first woman to be ordained as a priest in Italy under the Vetero Catholics, which is an offshoot of the Catholic Church. “Why should love that does not follow tradition be illegal?” she asked the congregation made up of same-sex and heterosexual couples. “Your vows to each other are as important as any other’s.”

The Rome ceremony is the second same-sex wedding in Italy in a matter of days. Last week, a city counselor in Bologna united Ida and Mariagrazia at a symbolic ceremony that divided the city and prompted staunch criticism from the Catholic Church. Bologna bishop Giovanni Silvagni said the marriage was an affront to unions between heterosexual couples. “This is a move against nature and against the order,” he said in response to the wedding, which was held in a hospice unit of a hospital where one of the brides is fighting terminal cancer.

In Milan, the city council has offered a civil-union registry, but it carries few benefits and is more like a petition for rights of gay couples. Most gay couples that wish to have their unions recognized with a legal document must do so in another country, even though no legal rights transfer back to Italy.

France plans to recognize gay marriages in October, following Belgium, Denmark, Iceland, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden, which have all passed laws that give rights to same-sex couples. French politicians who support the new legislation have even introduced a bill that would remove the words husband, wife, mother, and father from legal bureaucratic documents to help pave the way for nontraditional couples and families. French president François Hollande promised to redefine marriage in his election campaign and has introduced a bill that will now define marriage as “a union of two people, of different or the same gender.”

But in Italy, where the Catholic Church still holds significant sway over the political process, gay marriage is still taboo. Rosy Bindi, president of the center-left Democratic Party, said she would consider supporting legislation for rights for same-sex couples under the statutes being revised for common-law marriages and heterosexual civil unions, but she said she would not support same-sex marriage. Nichi Vendola, the governor of Puglia and the country’s most outspoken gay politician, said that it is not enough. “At 54 I want to be able to marry my companion, or at least start the conversation,” he said at a debate on the topic. “As a citizen, as a person and as a Christian I want a real discussion and ask my state and my church why expressions of love cannot be released by an attitude carried over from the Middle Ages.”

Sunday’s ceremony in Rome was not legal, and there were a dozen body guards outside the church to stop anyone who might protest or disrupt the union from entering the church, but it was a landmark ceremony in a city that is largely considered the capital of Catholicism.

“This ceremony may not be recognized by the law,” said Tosatti. “But it is a step in the right direction.”

Complete Article HERE!

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U.S. Roman Catholics outraged over child sex abuse scandal; call for bishop’s resignation

Calls for Bishop Robert Finn’s resignation intensified the day after he became the highest-ranking U.S. church official to be convicted of a crime related to a child sexual abuse scandal.

Soon after a Missouri judge found Bishop Finn guilty Thursday of one misdemeanor count of failing to report suspected child sexual abuse to the state, unhappy Roman Catholics began discussing ways to get the bishop out of office on a Facebook page titled “Bishop Finn Must Go.”

Among the posts was one that listed contact information for the Vatican and urged parishioners to voice their displeasure with Bishop Finn at the highest levels. Pope Benedict XVI alone has authority over bishops. Through the decades-long abuse scandal, only one U.S. bishop has stepped down over his failures to stop abusive clergy: Cardinal Bernard Law – who, in 2002, resigned as head of the Archdiocese of Boston.

Jackson County Judge John M. Torrence sentenced Bishop Finn to two years of supervised probation. If the bishop abides by a set of stipulations from the judge, the conviction will be wiped from his record in 2014.

“Now that our justice system says he’s guilty, he has lost his ability to lead our diocese,” Patricia Rotert, a Catholic church member in Kansas City, said Friday. “He’s lost his credibility. There is turmoil and angst around him and I don’t think he can bring people together.”

Bishop Finn’s attorneys would not comment on the bishop’s future in the church, saying it was a legal matter.

However, Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph spokesman Jack Smith indicated that Bishop Finn wasn’t going anywhere.

“The bishop looks forward to continuing to perform his duties, including carrying out the important obligations placed on him by the court,” Mr. Smith said in an emailed statement Friday.

Bishop Finn’s conviction comes four years after the church paid $10 million to settle 47 pending sexual abuse claims against the diocese and 12 of its priests. When announcing that deal in 2008, Bishop Finn apologized for the abuse that occurred at the hands of current and former clergy members, and promised that steps were being taken to make sure such abuse never happened again.

The diocese posted an update about the 2008 settlement on its website in June 2011 stating that Bishop Finn had written 118 letters of apology to plaintiffs or their families. That same month, Bishop Finn apologized for not responding to warnings the diocese received a year earlier from a parish principal detailing suspicious behavior by the Reverand Shawn Ratigan around children.

Instead of reading the memo and looking into the claims, Bishop Finn left it up to subordinates to handle the matter. He later admitted it was a year before he finally read a five-page document that a parish elementary school principal wrote detailing suspicious activities by Rev. Ratigan around children.

Bishop Finn also was informed of nude photos of children found on Rev. Ratigan’s laptop computer in December 2010, but instead of turning them over to police, Bishop Finn sent Rev. Ratigan to live at a convent in Independence, Mo.

Monsignor Robert Murphy turned the photos over to police in May 2011 — against Bishop Finn’s wishes, according to court documents — after Rev. Ratigan continued to violate Bishop Finn’s orders to stay away from children and not take any pictures of them.

Rev. Ratigan pleaded guilty last month to five child pornography counts, but hasn’t been sentenced. Prosecutors have requested he spend the rest of his life in prison.

Bishop Finn apologized again Thursday in court for the pain caused by his failure to report Rev. Ratigan.

The bishop has avoided facing charges in Missouri’s Clay County, where Rev. Ratigan was charged, after reaching a settlement in November 2011. For five years, Bishop Finn must report to the Clay County prosecutor directly each month about any suspected child abuse in the diocese’s facilities in the county.

“I said for years that we wouldn’t be in the mess we were in today if about 30 bishops had said `I made a mistake, I’m sorry, I take full responsibility and I resign,“’ said the Reverand Thomas J. Reese, a senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center at Georgetown University. “I think we’re at a state in the life of the church when a bishop is convicted of a misdemeanor, found guilty of not doing what he was supposed to do, I think he should resign for the good of the diocese and the good of the church.”

Support for Bishop Finn’s resignation is far from unanimous. Some say they agree he made a mistake, but it’s not one that should force him out, especially with even more stringent safeguards in place to protect children.

“There’s always been fights in the church, and there will continue to be fights in the church,” said Kansas City parishioner Bruce Burkhart, a member of the Serra Club, which supports and promotes priests.

“I think people may walk away, but that’s their business,” he said. “If they think their children are any more safe in public schools, or in another church setting where people are working with youth, the data indicate they’re not. The Catholic Church in America is probably now today the safest place for children.”

While Bishop Finn is the highest-ranking Catholic official to be charged in the U.S. with shielding an abusive priest, Albany Law School professor Timothy Lytton said the June conviction of Monsignor William Lynn in Philadelphia broke the ice on criminal convictions against members of the Catholic hierarchy.

Monsignor Lynn, who supervised other clergy as an aide to the cardinal, was convicted of felony child endangerment and became the first U.S. church official sent to prison for his handling of abuse complaints. He is appealing his three- to six-year sentence.

Still, Bishop Finn’s conviction is significant because it proves Monsignor Lynn’s criminal prosecution was not an isolated event, but instead something that is likely to embolden prosecutors to go after church leaders who fail to protect children.

“Kansas City might mark a trend,” Mr. Lytton said. “It’s no longer good enough to just file civil suits; criminal justice may be much quicker to get involved. Kansas City normalizes this kind of reaction to the scandal.”

Complete Article HERE!

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Catholic priest donated $1000 to gay ‘marriage,’ diocese mum

A Catholic priest’s donation to support redefining marriage in Minnesota has been revealed, deepening a rift between a conservative Catholic hierarchy and more liberal subordinates in the blue state over gay ‘marriage.’

The Duluth News Tribune reported Sunday that Rev. Peter Lambert of St. Louis Catholic Church in Floodwood had donated $1,000 to Minnesotans United for Families, the group fighting a constitutional marriage amendment, in March.

The Diocese of Duluth, where Lambert is stationed, has donated $50,000 to support the traditional marriage amendment. Duluth Diocese spokesman Kyle Eller told the Tribune that Lambert didn’t intend the donation to be a public statement.

“It was my understanding that Father Lambert wasn’t aware that the contribution would be made public, and it wasn’t intended to be a public statement,” said Eller, who declined further comment.

The diocese didn’t immediately respond to an email from LifeSiteNews.com requesting comment Tuesday.

The bishops in Minnesota have ranked among the most outspoken Catholic defenders of traditional marriage in the country in recent years. In 2010, the prelates backed a comprehensive six-week campaign to re-catechize their flock on the Church’s moral teaching on marriage and sexuality.

In January, Archbishop John Nienstedt of St. Paul and Minneapolis emphasized to clergy under his purview, which includes the Duluth diocese, the importance of their adherence to Church doctrine on the marriage question.

“The gravity of this struggle, and the radical consequences of inaction propels me to place a solemn charge upon you all,” he said. “On your ordination day, you made a promise to promote and defend all that the Church teaches. I call upon that promise in this effort to defend marriage. There ought not be open dissension on this issue.”

Nienstedt again urged the Catholic faithful this Sunday to support the proposed marriage amendment that will appear on the general election ballot this November.

Supporters of redefining marriage have meanwhile been targeting Catholics with their own message.

An openly homosexual religious priest from St. John’s Abbey in Collegeville, Minn. told a crowd of 200 in June that Catholics are permitted to vote against the amendment as a matter of freedom of conscience.

“I believe this amendment violates an important principle of Catholic teaching, and that as Catholics, we can vote no,” Rev. Bob Pearson said.

Complete Article HERE!

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Bishop Finn found guilty of one of two counts of failure to report suspected child abuse

BREAKING NEWS!

A Jackson County judge found Bishop Robert Finn guilty on Thursday on one count of failing to report suspected child abuse. He was found not guilty on the other count. The state asked the judge to put Finn on probation, according to court reports.

A judge granted the state’s request for court-supervised probation. The conditions include mandated reporter training, institute training for clergy and a $10,000 fund for victims of abuse.

After the verdict was read, Finn spoke to the court, saying he regretted what happened and was sorry for the hurt the events caused, according to court reports.

After the ruling, Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker dropped all charges against the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph.

Finn was charged with the misdemeanors for not reporting suspected child abuse from Dec. 2012 to May 2011 in connection with allegations against Rev. Shawn Ratigan.

Ratigan pleaded guilty to four counts of producing child pornography and one count of attempting to produce child pornography in August.

According to court documents, after being informed of pornographic photographs of young girls found on Ratigan’s computer, Finn sent the priest to a hospital for psychiatric care instead of reporting him to authorities.

The diocese didn’t turn over evidence to law enforcement until May 2011, after Finn found out Ratigan had violated orders to stay away from children.

Complete Article HERE!

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Catholic bishop says church’s credibility on sexual abuse is ‘shredded’

The U.S. Catholic bishops’ point man on sexual abuse has said that the hierarchy’s credibility on fixing the problem is “shredded” and that the situation is comparable to the Reformation, when “the episcopacy, the regular clergy, even the papacy were discredited.”

Bishop R. Daniel Conlon

Bishop R. Daniel Conlon of Joliet, Ill., last month told a conference of staffers who oversee child safety programs in American dioceses that he had always assumed that consistently implementing the bishops’ policies on child protection, “coupled with some decent publicity, would turn public opinion around.”

“I now know this was an illusion,” Conlon, chairman of the bishops’ Committee for the Protection of Children and Young People, said in an address on Aug. 13 to the National Safe Environment and Victim Assistance Coordinators Leadership Conference in Omaha, Neb.

His talk was published in the Aug. 30 edition of Origins, an affiliate of Catholic News Service.

Conlon said that the conviction of a high-ranking church official in Philadelphia for covering up clergy abuse and the upcoming trial of a bishop in Missouri on charges of failing to report a priest on suspicions of child abuse have contributed to a widespread impression that the bishops “have failed to keep their commitments.”

The bishop disputed that view, but said even close friends “turned almost hostile” over dinner recently when he said the hierarchy has adopted “an entirely different spirit of openness and accountability.”

Conlon told the conference that the bishops still needed to clarify emerging questions about how to deal with issues like child pornography and “boundary violations” in which church personnel might engage in inappropriate interactions with children that don’t yet cross the line into physical abuse.

But he said that the bottom line is that the bishops “are gravely weakened and in need of assistance” in developing policies and changing public perceptions. He told the child safety workers to think of themselves “as an extension of your bishop.”

“Our credibility on the subject of child abuse is shredded,” Conlon said. “You may have a better chance. People — in the church, outside the church, and hanging on the edge — need to know that real progress is being made.”

Complete Article HERE!

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Archbishop Nienstedt’s latest marriage-amendment letter adds to Catholic turmoil

On Sunday, priests in a number of Twin Cities Roman Catholic parishes read a letter from Archbishop John Nienstedt re-stating the church’s support for the proposed constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage.

On Monday, Michael Bayly, the director of Catholics for Marriage Equality, noticed a spike in requests for the group’s lawn signs, which read, “Another Catholic Voting No.”

Some of the people who stopped by his south Minneapolis office to pick them up told him people had walked out of their churches during the reading. A parishioner at the nearby Church of the Annunciation said half a dozen left her service.

On Thursday, the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis’s official publication, the Catholic Spirit, carried the text of the letter.

Meanwhile, the Facebook site “I am Catholic. I am Voting NO!” acquired a list of parishes where the letter was not read. The most prominent of the 17 churches listed: Minneapolis’ Basilica of St. Mary.

In the letter, Nienstedt asserts that the purpose of the ballot initiative has been misconstrued. “Our effort to support God’s unchanging plan for marriage is not a campaign against anyone, but rather a positive effort to promote the truth about marriage as a union between one man and one woman,” he writes.

“But the reality is that marriage is not ours to redefine, just as another human life is not ours to take,” the archbishop continues. “God is both the author of life and the author of marriage. It is this most fundamental understanding of the natural order that animates who we are as Catholics. … It is also why we fight to defend God’s plan for marriage, because his providence is as clear for what marriage is as it is for the dignity of each human life. …

“Now, Minnesota for Marriage needs your help to get the message out. We must ensure that Minnesotans know what is at stake and have the correct information about why they should vote ‘Yes’ for the marriage amendment. (Remember that if you leave the ballot box blank, the government votes ‘No’ for you!).”

The Archdiocese did not return calls seeking comment Thursday.

Bayly hears something different. “He seems to have softened his language about gay people,” he said, referring to Nienstedt. “They must have realized they’ve alienated people.”

“We know that some who are seeking to redefine marriage experience same-sex attractions,” the letter reads. “Our brothers and sisters living with same-sex attraction are beloved children of God who must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity.

“Every sign of unjust discrimination in this regard must be avoided. People with same-sex attractions, like others in society, are productive citizens, community servants, good friends and our beloved family members.

“At the same time, however, it is important to know that the effort to ensure that the definition of marriage remains as between one man and one woman does not take away anyone’s existing rights or legal protections. As Catholics, we believe that all people should be able to visit loved ones in the hospital, pass on their property to whomever they choose and have access to employment, housing and the basic necessities of life. Saying ‘yes’ to God’s plan for marriage will not change any of this.”

In recent months, Catholics who either plainly disagree with the church’s stance on marriage rights for gays and lesbians or who are wrestling with their consciences have been increasingly visible. The conflicted parishioners have organized everything from informational meetings in borrowed, non-Catholic churches to vigils outside the Chancery.

Many were offended by Nienstedt’s decision to take a very active role in the campaign for the amendment. To date, Minnesota Catholic churches and groups have given $1 million to the vote-yes effort.

Others have been unhappy with statements that put their love for their church in opposition to their love for LGBT relatives and friends. One example: A letter Nienstedt penned for the Catholic Spirit soon after his 2007 ascension in which he warned that those “who actively encourage or promote homosexual acts … formally cooperate in a grave evil, and … are guilty of mortal sin.”

Still others were upset that in the run-up to the 2010 gubernatorial contest, Nienstedt distributed 400,000 DVDs, paid for by an anonymous donor and by the Knights of Columbus, urging Catholics to vote for the only candidate in the race opposed to same-sex marriage, Tom Emmer.

“That language and that approach has clearly been ditched,” said Bayly. Still, he added, “The fact that they can’t bring themselves to talk about gay people or lesbian people is offensive.”

The divide has put the church in the headlines numerous times in recent months. In late July, newspapers reported that Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie, himself the topic of amendment-related news stories, had been invited to speak at St. Joan of Arc Church in Minneapolis. Later stories reported that he was subsequently uninvited and then that his appearance had been postponed.

At the same time, some members of a group of 102 former priests that signed on to a statement opposing the amendment have disagreed publicly with the church’s depiction of its teachings.

“That conscience must rule is consistent with what all of us former priests learned in seminary,” Ed Kohler wrote in a letter published earlier this month in the Pioneer Press. “That conscience must rule is also consistent with the current Pope Benedict XVI — who taught, while still Father Joseph Ratzinger, that ‘Over the pope as the expression of the binding claim of ecclesiastical authority, there still stands one’s own conscience, which must be obeyed before all else, even if necessary against the requirements of ecclesiastical authority.’”

One active priest, Bob Pierson, told some 200 Catholics at an event in Edina that they can vote against a proposal to amend the Minnesota Constitution to ban gay marriage. Bayly and several other members of Catholics for Marriage Equality say they have been told the Archdiocese has ordered Pierson to stay silent on the issue from now on.

“There are groups of Catholics who are hungry for alternative perspectives on this,” Bayly said. “I’ve got a pretty well-full September of speaking engagements around the state.”

Complete Article HERE!

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‘Boys will be boys,’ Bishop Finn purportedly said after being told of priest’s lewd photos

When confronted by the diocese’s computer director about her concerns over lewd images found on a priest’s laptop, Bishop Robert Finn replied that, “Sometimes priests do things they shouldn’t,” court papers filed Thursday alleged.

“Sometimes, boys will be boys,” the bishop is purported to have said, court records show.

Julie Creech, the director of management and information systems for the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, described her meeting with the bishop during an Aug. 17 deposition in a Jackson County civil case. According to that lawsuit, the Rev. Shawn Ratigan abused a 9-year-old girl months after the diocese learned of the photos on his computer.

Finn and the diocese are scheduled for a criminal trial starting Sept. 24 on misdemeanor counts of failing to report Ratigan’s suspected abuse of children. Ratigan is awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty in federal court earlier this month to producing and attempting to produce child pornography.

State prosecutors have identified Creech as a witness in their case against Finn and the diocese. A prosecutor’s spokesman declined comment on the Creech deposition Thursday.

The diocese and lawyers representing Finn declined comment Thursday.

Rebecca Randles, the lawyer representing the girl and her parents who filed the lawsuit, also declined to comment.

Though Creech’s concerns in December 2010 about the contents of Ratigan’s laptop previously had been reported in a fact-finding study commissioned by the diocese, her meeting with Finn had not been disclosed publicly until today.

According to the study, prepared by former U.S. Attorney Todd Graves, Creech examined Ratigan’s laptop on Dec. 16, 2010, and discovered hundreds of disturbing photographs of young children, primarily girls. That evening, Creech called vicar general Robert Murphy and advised him to call police, the study said. The diocese did not report the suspected abuse until May 2011.

In the Graves report, Finn said he didn’t see what was on the computer.

The civil motion filed Thursday quotes Creech as having been concerned when she heard that some at the diocese were saying that she had not found “lewd” photographs on the computer. In a partial deposition transcript included with the civil filings, Creech said she approached Finn about the diocese’s response to the Ratigan discoveries.

Finn, she noted, was not specific as to what actions the diocese would take.

“He did indicate that, you know, sometimes priests do things that they shouldn’t, and he said, you know, he said, ‘Sometimes boys will be boys,’ ” Creech said in the deposition.

Creech said she had no indication that Finn had ever seen any of the images from Ratigan’s computer and that the bishop never told her that he had.

Creech said in the deposition that she was “upset” during her meeting with Finn.

“I think I was upset in a different way than he was because of what I had seen,” Creech said.

Creech did not immediately return a call Thursday seeking comment.

Finn always has maintained that he never saw the images and that he had delegated the diocese’s initial response and management to his subordinates.

The civil lawsuit in which the deposition pages were filed Thursday alleges that Ratigan engaged a 9-year-old girl in sexually explicit conduct as late as May 2011 — about five months after the diocese learned of the pictures.

Complete Article HERE!