Pope Francis accepts resignation of Cardinal Donald Wuerl, appoints him interim DC leader

[Crusader13]

Unfortunately many people within the Church are treating incidents of sexual abuse and sexual harassment, with a Sola Scriptura mindset. By that I mean, unless there is some written word documenting the abuses, along with signed letters by the abusers themselves, they won’t believe it. No matter how many victims come forward. Cases such as these need to be considered for what they are and in many such cases it’s no different then other crimes of violence and murder. Meaning, it would be nice to have an open and shut case, with a murder weapon, video evidence, a signed confession by the killer, etc, etc. However, men such as McCarrick and Wuerl, don’t last as long as they have by leaving an easy to follow trail.

What we do have has at least raised some eyebrows and has caused many within the Church to start asking the tough questions. The Church, universally, has paid out, roughly $4 billion dollars because of the sex abuse scandals by the clergy. For Wuerl, to come out and say “…this isn’t some massive, massive crisis…” is disturbing. Wuerl’s actions as a whole, not just including what was written about in the PA grand jury report, have many people doubting his ability to remain trustworthy and to lead his flock.

Even if all we had was the case of George Zirwas, for Wuerl to come out and give him such a glowing eulogy, shows that Wuerl’s judgment is seriously flawed.

 

[gam197]

McCarrick and Wuerl are not the same.
We are judging by today’s standard. During the 50’s, 60’s,70’s,80’s there was no standard and that was the problem.

Priest got away with things. It could easily be explained away with groping, that the student misunderstood his helping fix his clothes until more cases came forth.

In a lifesite news article Wuerl says this…

“I have clarified over and over again that during the 12 years that I served as archbishop of Washington no one ever brought me any allegation of misconduct, sexual misconduct by Cardinal McCarrick,” he said.

and more…

“I made errors of judgment when we were dealing with all those cases before the Dallas Charter,” he told O’Connell, referring to the U.S. bishops’ 2002 guidelines on handling priestly sex abuse cases. “Some of those errors in judgment were based on professional psychological evaluations, some of the errors were based on moving too slowly as we tried to find some verification of the allegations. Those were all judgmental errors, and I certainly regret them.”

It does get cloudy when it comes to archbishop Vigano.

 

[Crusader13]

We are judging by today’s standard. During the 50’s, 60’s,70’s,80’s there was no standard and that was the problem.

Priest got away with things. It could easily be explained away with groping that the student misunderstood his helping fix his clothes.

If this logic were applied to McCarrick or others, maybe there would be some validity to it if it were a single accusation. However, this line of reasoning becomes unbelievable when you look at the history of abuse and the numerous allegations brought against men like McCarrick and others who have similar histories of abuse and documented sexual encounters with young men and boys.

“I have clarified over and over again that during the 12 years that I served as archbishop of Washington no one ever brought me any allegation of misconduct, sexual misconduct by Cardinal McCarrick,” he said.

and more…

Of course that’s what he would say. That’s the whole point of this massive cover up! Every FRIEND, ASSOCIATE, ALLY of McCarrick has come out and said “I never knew, never heard, was never approached by anyone about McCarrick and his abuse…” Maybe it’s because people knew that Wuerl was friends with McCarrick and it would be just another dead end. Maybe it’s because the victims didn’t know who to trust within the Church and they were already shunned and let down by their own local priest when they came forward.

The bottom line is that everybody is tired of hearing that same nonsense “I didn’t know…” When so many others, not even affiliated with McCarrick’s inner circle did hear and did know what was going on.

“I made errors of judgment when we were dealing with all those cases before the Dallas Charter,” he told O’Connell, referring to the U.S. bishops’ 2002 guidelines on handling priestly sex abuse cases. “Some of those errors in judgment were based on professional psychological evaluations, some of the errors were based on moving too slowly as we tried to find some verification of the allegations. Those were all judgmental errors, and I certainly regret them.”

He just made the case for his own resignation. Regardless of whether or not he regrets his decisions, he shouldn’t be allowed to remain in his leadership position with his track record.

 

[gam197]

People during the 50’s,60’s,70’s an 80’s did not talk about such things. Agree that the ones that it touched got little recourse. I am not trying to minimize what went on…

It is troubling that McCarrick (age 88) advanced to become Cardinal. Was he helped by a network of dead priests abusers and some current priests?

From the New York Times…

"At least one priest warned the Vatican against the appointment. The Rev. Boniface Ramsey said that when he was on the faculty at the Immaculate Conception Seminary at Seton Hall University in New Jersey from 1986 to 1996, he was told by seminarians about Archbishop McCarrick’s sexual abuse at the beach house. When Archbishop McCarrick was appointed to Washington, Father Ramsey spoke by phone with the pope’s representative in the nation’s capital, Archbishop Gabriel Montalvo, the papal nuncio, and at his encouragement sent a letter to the Vatican about Archbishop McCarrick’s history.

Father Ramsey, now a priest in New York City, said he never got a response."

As far as Cardinal Wuerl(age 77) was he one not to pay attention to what he may have seen as idle gossip(McCarrick was certainly not liked by many) or are he and/or others in the hierarchy who befriended McCarrick lying to protect a cover-up.

 

[gam197]

I don’t like it that Pope Francis wrote Cardinal Wuerl a letter before he resigned almost coaching him to do so.

Sure he may have had some bad judgement calls(3 cases out of how many) but he admits that. We all are imperfect. If he felt he was innocent of charges made he should not have resigned and I don’t care if no priest will serve mass with him. What good does resigning do?