Cardinal Bernard Law, the former Boston archbishop who resigned in disgrace during the church sex abuse scandal, has died. Law and the Catholic Church were plunged into scandal in 2002, when it was revealed that Law and other bishops had covered for pedophile priests in the Boston Archdiocese. Law never faced criminal sanctions for his role in allowing abusive priests to remain in parishes and, in fact, went on to serve as archpriest of the Papal Liberian Basilica of St. Mary Major in Rome, a position he held until his death. His detractors found his second career at the Vatican to be a revealing referendum on the church’s legitimacy and its consideration of the scandal’s young victims.
