NEW YORK TIMES: The retired archbishop of Los Angeles, Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, and other high-ranking clergymen in the archdiocese worked quietly to keep evidence of child molesting away from law enforcement officials and shield abusive priests from criminal prosecution more than a decade before the scandal became public, according to confidential church records.
The documents, filed in court as part of lawsuit against the archdiocese and posted online by The Los Angeles Times on Monday, offer the clearest glimpse yet of how the archdiocese dealt with abusive priests in the decades before the scandal broke, including Cardinal Mahony’s personal involvement in covering up their crimes.
Rather than defrocking priests and contacting the police, the archdiocese sent priests who had molested children to out-of-state treatment facilities, in large part because therapists in California were legally obligated to report any evidence of child abuse to the police, the files make clear… (more)
EDITOR: What is becoming more and more apparent is that permissiveness concerning pedophilia was common during past decades throughout society , be it Catholic Church, the Boys Scouts, Hasidic Jews, and probably any other large group. Penn States’ involvement was tangential but, in part due to Gov. Tom Corbett push to fire national icon Coach Joe Paterno, Penn State became an unlikely symbol of failure to protect children.
