The Independent News Source
Twitter - Facebook - Email Alerts - RSS
Keating recalls service on review board
Aug. 14, 2009
Printer-friendly version
Send to friend
PDF version
Former Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating (UPI/Michael Kleinfeld)
Printer-friendly versionSend to friendPDF versionWASHINGTON -- When Frank Keating, then the Republican governor of Oklahoma, agreed in 2002 to serve as the first chair of the board established by the U.S. bishops to investigate clergy sex abuse, he was admittedly naive. “I couldn’t imagine that something like this could happen,” Keating told 200-plus attendees of the 21st annual gathering of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) on Aug. 8.
Initially, said Keating, he believed that accusations that bishops and other church leaders coddled molesters and covered up their actions were largely untrue, the result of “an anti-Catholic bias.” But as he began to understand the scope of the crisis, said the blunt-spoken former high-ranking FBI official and federal prosecutor, he concluded that there was only one adequate response. Those guilty of “criminal conduct should be locked up,” he said. “Criminals are criminals -- take them out and jail them.”
Further, said Keating, bishops and other church officials who covered up for clergy molesters were also culpable. “What these people did is criminal ... and if I aid and abet I am equally a participant in that crime,” he said.
That law enforcement approach, said Keating, did not endear him to the bishops who had asked him to lead the National Review Board. In his yearlong tenure heading the panel, said Keating, he was subjected to backbiting and vicious innuendo that he did not expect from leaders of the church. Among the incidents was an accusation from a church official in Keating’s home state of Oklahoma that Keating “never goes to Mass and actually keeps a mistress.” Both charges were untrue, Keating said, though he never received an apology.
Likewise, he said, when he suggested that Catholics unsatisfied with a particular bishop’s response to clergy molesters should “vote with their feet” and withhold their contributions, the Boston archdiocesan newspaper accused him of “encouraging Catholics to commit a mortal sin.” In fact, said Keating, he was urging Catholics to attend Mass elsewhere and direct their contributions to other Catholic institutions.
The final straw in Keating’s rocky one-year tenure came when he told the press that that some bishops were trying to quash the board’s inquiry by using tactics more suited to an organized crime entity than a church. “My remarks, which some bishops found offensive, were deadly accurate,” wrote Keating in his resignation letter. He continued, “I make no apology. To resist grand jury subpoenas, to suppress the names of offending clerics, to deny, to obfuscate, to explain away; that is the model of a criminal organization, not my church.”
He stood by his comments at the SNAP meeting. Bishops who “hire a lawyer to seek to quash a subpoena indicates to me that [they have] a lot to hide,” he said.
Keating, now president of a Washington lobbying group representing life insurance companies, acknowledged that since his departure from the board he has not followed details related to the abuse crisis. Still, he said, the current review board consists of “not particularly high-profile high-velocity people,” some of whom are employed by the church. It would be preferable, he said, if the board consisted of “people who don’t need the bishop.”
Joe Feuerherd is NCR publisher. His e-mail address is jfeuerherd@ncronline.org.
Thank you, Frank Keating, for
Thank you, Frank Keating, for your continued honesty, your telling it like it was and is. I was glad to have had the opportunity to listen to you at SNAP's recent conference in D.C./Crystal City and talk with you afterward.
Accountability & Transparency are as elusive now as they were in 2002. For example, neither the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, California nor the Diocese of Bridgeport, Connecticut has abided by court rulings in their respective states to release of files, records etc., to the public. Many bishops will still not release the names and locations of known sexual predators.
Dioceses across the country in states from New York, to Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio and Colorado continue to oppose legislation that would better protect all of society's children from sexual predators of any stripe, belonging to any institution. And this is done to escape accountability for their own crimes as enablers and facilitators of criminal acts. Millions of dollars are being spent in public relations campaigns of disinformation, deceit, and defamation.
What Church leaders should do is admit what they and their predecessors have done, ask for forgiveness and do penance for their sins and crimes and start acting in the manner Jesus instructed them when he told them to "protect these least of my little ones."
Sister Maureen Paul Turlish
Victims' Advocate
New Castle, Delaware
maureenpaulturlish@yahoo.com
Thank you Sister Turlish for
Thank you Sister Turlish for so intelligently acknowledging this brilliant article, and the need for an independent and aggressive board to lance this cancer invading the Mystical Body, instead of a board investigating without mercy our good sisters . . .
Such a waste, but may the Church grow the richer when all has been "lost" . . .
Keep the Faith.
Several years ago, the then
Several years ago, the then current Pope had proclaimed a Year of Repentance for the criminal acts & moral failings of the ordained leadership of the Church, in an effort to deflect criticism & lawsuits against the Church.
BUT SINCE THERE HAS BEEN NO REPENTANCE OR REVERSAL OF THE COVERUP/ DENIAL BEHAVIOR BY CHURCH LEADERS, THE FINANCIAL & ABUSE SCANDALS HAVE CONTINUED TO GROW!!!
The leadership at the top sets the tone of any organization, so what do we lowly laity think about our leaders??? We ignore their proclamations, since their behavior is far too often like that of the Pharisees & Saduccees of Christ's time. If they can't follow their own moral rules, then why should we think that they speak for Christ, or that we have any need to take them seriously???
Since so many parishes have been closed, then why haven't some dioceses been merged as well??? That would be a face-saving excuse to relieve culpable Bishops & Cardinals from public leadership!!!
"As you do to the least of my brethren, you do it to ME"!!!
Anonymous, you are so right!
Anonymous, you are so right! "Cradle Catholics" are brainwashed from day 1 and simply cannot accept this crisis due to their fear of going to hell. To do so shatters them from the inside.
Speaking truth to power in
Speaking truth to power in this scandal has always been extraordinarily risky.
There are many things that need saying which, when they are said, tend to shatter the beliefs which various institutions, from dioceses to religious orders to their umbrella organizations, find very convenient.
In particular, it's been convenient for the laity to believe that which the institutions have known to be manifestly untrue.
What Frank Keating really
What Frank Keating really said when asked about Catholic Cardinals and Bishops was" "dealing with them {on this subject} was like dealing with La Cosa Nostra." Kurt Gladsky, Founder: Christian Brothers Sexual Abuse Survivors Network
Sister Turlish is just plain
Sister Turlish is just plain wrong. You are invited to read the newspaper reports about the settlement. Better yet, read the settlement document itself.
The settlement DID NOT -- COULD NOT -- require the Archdiocese to dump personnel files onto the public square.
In California, a personnel file is the property of the individual, not the organization to which he or she belongs. As such, the law restricts what can and cannot be released from a person's file. That's partly why a judge barred the Archdiocese from releasing summaries of files to the public, until he was sure that the summaries did not violate the law.
The settlement provided for a process in which an individual claimant could petition a retired judge (agreed upon by plaintiff attorneys, by the way) for release of a particular file. The judge would review the contents, hold back what could not be released by law, and release what could be released.
Sister, you are someone who says she is highly knowledgeable about the abuse crisis. If so, why doesn't this seem to be reflected in much of what you say and write? Be angry, but be accurate.
Finally, to my knowledge, since 2008, the aforementioned document review process has not been utilized.
Tod Tamberg would like the
Tod Tamberg would like the world to believe that the institutional Roman Catholic Church of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles had or has some GREAT RESPECT FOR THE LAW when the actions of church officials, especially since 2002, has demonstrated otherwise.
First there is the HISTORICAL FACT of the sexual violation of untold numbers of INNOCENT CHILDREN by hundreds and hundreds of sexual predators, priests mind you, to say nothing of the violation of young people and vulnerable adults.
Not only did CHURCH LEADERSHIP CHOOSE NOT TO FOLLOW THE LAWS OF THE LAND REGARDING THE OBLIGATION TO REPORT KNOWN OR SUSPECTED CHILDHOOD SEXUAL ABUSE, by their own admission ENABLING members of the hierarchy chose to transfer known or suspected predatory priests from parish to parish to parish and even aided and abetted their leaving the country in some instances rather then fulfill their mandate from the Lord Jesus Christ, "to protect these least of my little ones."
Would that it had been different, Mr. Tod Tamberg.
Would that the institutional Roman Catholic hierarchy had shown such respect for the law in protecting our children in the past as you claim it now has in protecting the records and files of convicted, known or credibly accused sexual predators.
Perhaps if the LAW HAD BEEN FOLLOWED then, there would not be so many broken souls, broken hearts and broken bodies that need our care and support now.
I am talking here of the victim/survivors of clergy sexual abuse. I am not speaking of those who DID NOT SURVIVE, leaving grieving parents, family and friends to try and understand why such things could happen and then be covered up by enablers.
CLERICALISM is still very much alive today in the institutional church. The ABUSE OF AUTHORITY by the hierarchy of the institutional Roman Catholic Church has yet to be addressed. The bishops both as a group and individually, both past and present, have not been investigated or held accountable for their part in this horrific debacle.
No, Tod Tamberg, even your own words are a disingenuous testament to the -
"DO AS I SAY NOT AS I DO" mindset.
Jesus had a few choice words of his own for those similarly described when he said:
"Anyone who would harm one of these least of my little ones, it would be better if a millstone was tied around his neck and he were tossed into the sea."
Well, Sister Turlish, you can
Well, Sister Turlish, you can CAP EVERY SENTENCE, if you like. But the fact remains that in all of your VERY CLERICAL-LIKE sermonizing, you do not take on the main point of my email, which is that you consistently GET IT WRONG when it comes to speaking about the details of sexual abuse in the church. This, despite readily available facts to the contrary (ie., newspapers, radio, television...).
I hope your words are not indicative of Voice of the Faithful's new project to promote dialogue and change within the church? Yikes! How is VOTF going to do any of that when its own leadership wish death by drowning to their fellow Catholics who disagree with such harsh rhetoric and misstatement of fact?
But before I sink to the bottom of the sea, I invite you again to find fault with the truth of the statements in my last email. Please feel free to cite pertinent news stories and settlement documents, which are readily available to you through your connections.
Stay happy and dry!
Sister: 2 points. First, is
Sister:
2 points.
First, is the "Institutional Catholic Church" in LA different from the Catholic Church in LA? You use that word deliberately, so I would assume from that and some of your other posts that your ecclesiology is one where the "people" are "the real Church" and the priests and bishops are not part of it.
Second--at any point did you mount your high horse and address the concerns of all those victimized by LCWR member orders? Or are only victims of clergy sex abuse real victims. From many of your comments one would get the idea that you think every member of the clergy is evil and every sister is as sinless as the Blessed Mother. Since you obviously have done some research on the issue, you have surely seen how the numbers of those who were actually abusive is less than one percent and that there are numbers of LCWR religious guilty as well.
I don't usually respond to
I don't usually respond to Anonymous comments, especially in your case where you apparently do not have the guts to identify yourself, but I will make an exception.
First point - you should be able to figure out for yourself.
Second point - I have addressed this elsewhere and stated my position which is that anyone who has sexually violated a child should be held responsible for that violation. My position on this and my support for all victims of sexual abuse is clear and I have spoken publicly on this topic.
As for your one percent, that is factually incorrect. In some dioceses it has been found to be as low as four percent while in other dioceses it has been found to be as high as ten percent. I suggest you go to the website called Bishop Accountability to bone up.
The web address is - www.bishopaccountability.org
Another source of very good factual information is the website of Richard Sipe, a former Benedictine monk, he is a psychotherapist and a certified clinical mental health counselor.
His website is - www.richardsipe.com
And BTW, Anonymous, your demeaning attitude betrays the arrogance you are comfortable displaying while hiding behind your "Anonymous" identity.
I will not respond again.
As a Catholic wife, mother
As a Catholic wife, mother and advocate for “corrective” legislation similar to California’s 2003 Sex Abuse Law, it is difficult to witness Church leaders assert the urgency of abiding to personnel and privacy laws, on behalf of former employees credibly accused of sex crimes against precious children.
Sister Turlish’s post summarizes the tragic truths about the only Church most of us have ever known. Hundreds of thousands of dollars are spent to protect the personnel files of sexual predator employees, while church leaders and attorneys work diligently to convince the faithful in the pews that the clergy sex abuse crisis is in the past.
In remembering the strong and inspirational faith of Senator Edward Kennedy and his family, in the words he spoke at his brother Bobby’s eulogy, "To be remembered simply as a good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it," our country has lost a great man and leader today---we can only pray the legacy we leave for our children is one that encourages the protections of truth, justice and peace.
Mr. Tamberg has stuck his
Mr. Tamberg has stuck his foot in his mouth again. If he had thought about it, he would not have responded to Sister Maureen's comments. Obviously, she pushed his panic button and the result: Once again he is obviously covering for the diocese.
The actual article by Joe Feuerherd is excellent. Although I attended the SNAP conference, I did not attend Mr. Keating's session because I no longer believe there is much hope for transparency and truth on behalf of the bishops.
Kay Goodnow
Lenexa, KS
Frank Keating ran up against
Frank Keating ran up against a wall he wasn't expecting to hit, the hiearchy. He had the audacity to speak the truth and he was summarily dismissed. Anne Burke and her group were snubbed by Cardinal Egan in NY. Cardinal George in Chicago has violated the terms of the Dallas Charter more than once and if we close our ears, minds and hearts like the hierarchy has asked us to do on so many occasions while they allow criminals parading as priests to ravage our children, everything will be fine.
Everything is not fine and will not be fine until those who are guilty of aiding and abetting criminals are brought to justice.
Perhaps Mr. Tamberg can
Perhaps Mr. Tamberg can comment on this matter regarding convicted rapist Oliver O'Grady and Mahony:
In the film "Deliver Us From Evil," O'Grady divulged that on the night before he was to testify in a civil case about what Mahony knew when about O'Grady's abuse, diocesan representatives offered O’Grady an annuity if he would not appear.
How is that not bribery or witness tampering or obstruction of justice? The annuity is apparently timed for payments as of O’Grady’s 65th birthday.
O’Grady had already been convicted criminally, was sentenced to prison for seven years, and so facing a possible contempt charge for not testifying in a civil case meant nothing.
Where is the thorough investigation about this annuity?
Prompted by Mr. Tamberg to
Prompted by Mr. Tamberg to review the record, here’s more coverage of Mahony, in his own words as well:
Roger Mahony’s deposition offers wonderful insights into his mindset and character:
Part I http://www.bishop-accountability.org/depo/2004_11_23_Mahony_In_Clergy_II... Part II http://www.bishop-accountability.org/depo/2004_11_23_Mahony_In_Clergy_II...
And when is a memory lapse of such astounding proportion that it defies common sense and covers up perjury? See http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news2004_07_12/2004_12_11_Lattin_Ca...
A cardinal's shameless struggle for survival by award-winning investigative reporter, Jason Berry:
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/07...
“Mahony waged an expensive fight, which he lost at every rung of the ladder, to prevent release of clergy personnel files. The documents have still not been released. In 2002, church lawyers blocked the Los Angeles district attorney's subpoenas for files of priests targeted for criminal investigation.
As the clock ticked on statutes of limitations, several cases died. Meanwhile, as civil cases mounted, release of the disputed clergy personnel files became a core issue for survivors, who wanted the truth revealed. What is Mahony hiding?... The cold print in the priests' files is Mahony's nightmare.
Mahony's lawyers used a First Amendment ruse, arguing that constitutional freedom of religion cloaked a bishop's paper trail with pedophile priests. Stiff-arming judges, plaintiff attorneys, prosecutors, and abuse survivors, Mahony was buying time to protect himself, hoping media coverage would die down.
Or see Cardinal Untruths by Attorney Jeff Anderson
http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news2004_07_12/2004_12_15_Anderson_...
“For instance, despite new, damaging evidence, Mahony insists he did not lie when he testified in a civil trial in 1998 that he dealt with just one priest accused of molestation while he was the bishop of Stockton from 1980 to 1985. He says he simply forgot about memos in his own hand in 1981 and 1984 that show him lowering the boom on two previously undisclosed priests accused of molestation. Meanwhile, in 1984, he transferred a pedophile priest to a new parish where he molested again.
… After his sworn testimony, lawyers accused him of perjury, and sent a transcript to prosecutors in Northern California for investigation…
"No amount of public relations can turn this into a poor memory," says A.W. Richard Sipe, a psychotherapist, author and former priest. "For a man of his background and administrative capability to make such a claim is disgusting. We’re scratching at the surface of his character here. And you are seeing the philosophy of the Catholic hierarchy, which is, ‘I only lie when I have to.’ "
LA archdiocesan spokesman Tod
LA archdiocesan spokesman Tod Tamberg suggests Sr. Maureen check the facts in news accounts. I decided to do so. Here is some of the coverage, explaining why the document release process is stalled. It seems the judge had to recuse himself because of an unspecified honor bestowed on him by the Roman Catholic Church. How convenient. And Mr. Tamberg declined to comment.
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5i8ojQPKOQE9ApWbhjbfCoPDRf-egD93048I00
Documents Held in Los Angeles Priest Abuse Cases
More than a year after the agreement was announced, the sudden recusal of a retired judge unanimously selected to review the priests' files has threatened to undo the fragile deal and could send both sides back to court for months. At the same time, an attorney who has been paid by the church to defend accused clergy (Attorney Donald Steier) is fighting to keep those records sealed — and plaintiffs accuse the archdiocese of using him as their proxy…
Steier declined to say who was paying him for his current work on behalf of priests and a spokesman for the archdiocese, Tod Tamberg, declined to comment.
(Michael) Hennigan, the archdiocese attorney, said the church was not paying Steier now but paid the legal fees before the settlement of diocesan priests who had not been criminally convicted. He said it was possible the church could continue those payments going forward.
Under a settlement announced in July 2007, the Los Angeles archdiocese promised to release the priest personnel files to the court, which would then appoint retired state Supreme Court Justice Edward A. Panelli to review each one. Panelli, whose name was written into the settlement agreement as the mediator, would decide which documents could be released and which couldn't — and none of his rulings could be appealed.
But Panelli suddenly recused himself this summer because he received an unspecified honor from the Roman Catholic church, plaintiff attorney Ray Boucher said. Panelli declined an interview request through his assistant and archdiocese attorney Michael Hennigan said he didn't know why Panelli recused himself.