oversight

By Diogenes ( articles ) | Mar 12, 2007

A recent editorial by the National Catholic Reporter on financial auditing of parishes concludes with the following point:

Transparency is essential to the health of the community.

Your Uncle Di couldn't agree more. The Left's commitment to the process of auditing does have limits, however. Auditing of clerical sexual behavior seems to an entirely different matter:

Fr. John Canary, rector at Mundelein, confirmed to NCR Dec. 21 that two members of the 11-member (seminary visitation) team, led by Archbishop Elden Curtiss of Omaha, Neb., asked what Canary called “inappropriate” questions of seminarians about their sexual conduct. Though Canary did not specify, other sources said the two visitors asked, for example, about masturbation.

For Cardinal George's seminary rector, the solitary vice is still protected by the right to privacy. One does not have to imagine that it has been extended to other not-so-solitary vices as well.

Last month, an archdiocese audit found Mundelein seminary officials had learned in 1992 of three separate allegations of sexual misconduct by McCormack during his time at Niles College and St. Mary of the Lake.

Audits back then didn't cover 19 year old boys. Obviously an oversight.