decades before the clergy sexual-abuse crisis broke publicly across the U.S. Catholic landscape, the founder of a religious order that dealt regularly with priest sex abusers was so convinced of their inability to change that he searched for an island to purchase with the intent of using it as a place to isolate such offenders....
Fr. Gerald Fitzgerald, founder of the Servants of the Paracletes, an order established in 1947 to deal with problem priests, wrote regularly to bishops in the United States and to Vatican officials, including the pope, of his opinion that many sexual abusers in the priesthood should be laicized immediately. [Full text of letters.]
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Paper Says Catholic Church Knew of Priest Abuse Problem Earlier Than Previously Thought
National Catholic Reporter yesterday ran a long article disclosing that:
