I grew up in Allentown, PA which was part of the Philadelphia Archdiocese. While going to college I worked at the local newspaper, the Morning Call. Around the time I became an adult and moved away, the diocese of Allentown was formed. So I am especially interested in the unfolding abuse story in Philadelphia involving two Cardinals and now with criminal charges brought against a high diocesan official (Msgr. Lynn). The following excerpted story appeared today in the Morning Call relating recently unsealed testimony by 3rd Allentown Bishop Cullen stating essentially that covering up pedophiles was just the way "all the churches" dealt with child abuse. The evidence is stronger and stronger that protection of children was never a high priority with the hierarchy compared to the avoidance of public embarrassment.
Matt Assad and Peter Hall
Morning Call
Sept 11, 2011
Deputy Philadelphia District Attorney Charles Gallagher was keenly aware that he had the bishop of the Allentown Catholic Diocese in the witness chair, yet he was finding it difficult to beat back the anger that was welling up inside him.
Children had been molested by priests, and during a Philadelphia grand jury investigation in November 2003, Bishop Edward Cullen was struggling to explain why the church protected pedophiles and not the children they hurt.
His words straining as he tried to keep his composure, Gallagher demanded to know why church officials never called police.
"I mean, is that asking too much, bishop, because I really don't think it is?" Gallagher said, as he questioned Cullen before a grand jury of 29 people.
"They didn't have to report it to law enforcement," Cullen said.
"I don't care what they had to do or what they didn't have to do as far as the dictates of law," Gallagher said, his voice rising. "The dictates of the Catholic church, the dictates of their conscience, the dictates of what is right and what is wrong, why didn't they call law enforcement and say: We got a pedophile on our hands and we need law enforcement to take him off the streets?
"I'm sorry I raised my voice," he added.
"Oh, no, no, no, I understand. That's a very delicate topic," Cullen said. "I'm just saying when you ask about the Catholic church, that is what all — that is modus operandi of how things were handled in those days, and it wasn't just the Catholic church. It was all the churches."
Gallagher asked why church officials didn't follow what they "learned in their faith and do the right thing?"
"I think when it comes to issues of this kind, at that time they did follow the law. There is no question about it. And I wish it had been a different setting and a different — a different manner of acting, but unfortunately, that's what happened," Cullen said.
That terse exchange is encased in nearly 800 pages of newly released testimony by Cullen, taken during a grand jury investigation into decades of child sexual abuse by clergy in the Philadelphia Archdiocese. In a rare move, testimony in the clergy abuse investigation in 2003 and 2004 was unsealed two weeks ago by a Philadelphia judge after attorneys for The Philadelphia Inquirer argued that its use in a related criminal case made it public.
The file, which covers testimony from Cullen and 10 other church officials, provides a rare glimpse inside the Catholic church as it struggled to deal with an emerging problem of clergy sex abuse.
The two-year investigation led to a scathing 2005 report that accused the Philadelphia Archdiocese of protecting pedophile priests, but no charges were filed because the statute of limitations had expired for all the abuse uncovered.
A follow-up report, released this year after more recent victims came forward, led to rape charges against two priests, a defrocked priest and a teacher. In addition, Monsignor William Lynn was charged with conspiracy and felony child endangerment for moving known abusers to new parishes where they would again be in contact with children. All have pleaded not guilty and are awaiting trial.
Read the entire story at the Morning Call
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