From the Catholic lay group. Voice of the Faithful, came this cautionary note: “Many people think the clergy sexual abuse tragedy is history.  Many people also think that the Church culture, which enabled the abuse, is in reform.
“Yet, as an article in this month’s Boston Magazine discloses, former Boston Archdiocesan leader Bernard Cardinal Law – a symbol for what is wrong in our Church hierarchy – is far from exile in his post as archpriest of St. Mary Major, one of Rome’s four patriarchal basilicas.  Rather:

“Law now sits on eight of the Curia’s ‘dicasteries,’ or policy-implementing committees, a total far above average; Boston’s Archbishop Sean Cardinal O’Malley, for instance is a member of only two.  Cardinals living near Rome typically belong to more dicasteries than those overseas, so it is a measure of Law’s ambition that in his last year in Boston he served on no less than nine.  Thanks to his new station, his  participation is more intense than ever.  ‘Since  he’s in Rome he can attend the meetings on a regular basis,’ says Thomas J. Reese, a Jesuit priest and scholar of church administration. ‘He couldn’t do that when he was in Boston.  So his ability to influence has actually increased.’”

The article goes on to say:

“By far the most consequential of Cardinal Law’s roles is his membership in the Congregation for Bishops.  While the appointment of prelates is ultimately up to the pope, he chooses almost all of them on the recommendation of this body.  Each of the congregation’s 36 members has a vote on appointments, but members reportedly defer to colleagues from a given country on appointments in that land.  The congregation has five American members.  Cardinal Law, therefore, is one of a handful of men in charge of choosing the hierarchy of the American church.

“It goes on to quote Philip Lawler, editor of the Catholic World News, who worked for Law as editor of the archdiocesan newspaper in the late 1980s. We’re still waiting for the evidence that he understands what happened in Boston.  And if he doesn’t understand what caused his resignation, that raises questions for me about his perceptions of other problems, his ability to recognize what’s good for the Church.”

To read this article in its entirety, click on the link below:

“Our Man in Rome” by Francis X. Rocca
Originally published in Boston Magazine, September 2006: http://www.bostonmagazine.com/articles/our_man_in_rome/

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