By Dan Whitcomb
LOS ANGELES, Feb 15 (Reuters) – The archbishop of Los
Angeles, who stripped his predecessor of duties last month over
his handling of priest sex abuse cases, on Friday sent “warm
wishes” as the former archbishop headed to Rome to help select a
new pope amid the controversy.
Pope Benedict XVI surprised the world’s Catholics on Monday
by announcing plans to retire at the end of the month, and
Cardinal Roger Mahony, the former archbishop of Los Angeles,
declared he would take part in the process to select a
successor, a move that angered victims rights groups.
The announcement by Mahony, 76, came less than two weeks
after 12,000 pages of church files unsealed under court order
showed that he and a top aide, Thomas Curry, worked to send
priests accused of abuse out of state to shield them from law
enforcement scrutiny in the 1980s.
“I am sure you will join me in extending your prayers and
warm wishes for Cardinal Roger Mahony as he prepares to travel
to Rome to exercise his sacred duty as Cardinal Elector of our
next pope,” Los Angeles Archbishop Jose Gomez wrote in the
letter.
“I am confident that Cardinal Mahony’s accomplishments and
experience in the areas of immigration, social justice, sacred
liturgy and the role of laity in the church will serve the
College of Cardinals well as it works to discern the will of the
Holy Spirit in these deliberations that will lead to the
election of our new pope,” Gomez wrote.
Gomez also told the priests that despite media “confusion”
over the status of Mahony and Curry, they “both remain bishops
in good standing in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.”
“Both have full rights to celebrate the Holy sacraments of
the church and to minister to the faithful without restriction,”
he wrote. “Cardinal Mahony has all of the prerogatives and
privileges of his standing as a Cardinal of the Roman Catholic
Church.”
David Clohessy, spokesman for the victims rights group
Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said he found
Gomez’s letter offensive.
“It’s just rubbing more and more salt into the already deep
and still fresh wounds of not just hundreds of victims but
thousands of Catholics,” Clohessy said. “And it’s also
revealing, it shows how little the hierarchy of the church has
changed.”
Gomez stripped Mahony, who was archbishop of Los Angeles
from 1985 to 2011, of his public and administrative duties with
the church on the same day that the priest abuse files were
released. Curry also stepped down as bishop of Santa Barbara.
Mahony has apologized for “mistakes” he made as archbishop,
saying he had not been equipped to deal with the problem of
sexual misconduct involving children.
The Los Angeles archdiocese, which serves 4 million
Catholics, reached a $660 million civil settlement in 2007 with
more than 500 victims of child molestation in the biggest such
agreement of its kind in the nation.
(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Cynthia Johnston and
Leslie Adler)
