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CNN Live At Daybreak

Catholic Church Plagued By Abuse Scandals

Aired March 04, 2002 - 05:44   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Well a man who is accused of disrupting mass at a Boston Catholic church faces arraignment this morning. Cardinal Bernard Law was speaking to the congregation at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross yesterday, when Steven Lynch began berating him.

"The Boston Globe" reports a judge dismissed Lynch's complaint that he was abused by a priest as a child because of the statute of limitations had expired. The newspaper also reports the archdiocese could up paying as much as $100 million in previously settled and pending claims of sexual abuse by Boston priests.

More and more allegations of priests sexually abusing children are surfacing, and it's tarnishing the image of the Catholic church. Hillary Lane talks more about this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HILLARY LANE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The strong facade of the Catholic church again battered from inside its own walls. This time in St. Louis, the archdiocese removing two priests accused of sexually abusing minors. The bishop who oversees these claims had this message for more than 800 priests...

TIMOTHY DOLAN, AUXILIARY BISHOP: The church is on the cross, you people are on the cross and the priesthood is on the cross. It's under tremendous scrutiny and suffering.

LANE: The dismissals, another blob the U.S. priesthood's already stained image. Charges of sexual abuse against at least 80 Boston area priests, hushed for years. Over four decades, an estimated 130 children affected. The church protected its own, reassigning them, settling quietly out of court.

DAVID CLOHESSY, SURVIVOR'S NETWORK FOR THOSE ABUSED BY PRIESTS: If history has shown us anything, history has shown us that bishops are like any institutional leaders. Bishops are incapable of policing their own scandals.

LANE: There are plenty of examples. In 1984, public attention first focused on the problem when a Louisiana priest pled guilty to abusing 11 boys. Nearly two dozen other local priests eventually faced similar accusations. A rash of charges surfaced in the early 90's in Camden, New Jersey; Altoona, Pennsylvania; Santa Barbara, California; and even against Joseph Cardinal Bernadine (ph) in Chicago. In 1996 the diocese of Dallas was ordered to pay $120 million in damages to the victims of sexual abuse by priests.

(on camera): U.S. church leaders repeatedly have appealed to the Vatican to make it easier for parishes to remove priests believed to have sexually abused children. The U.S. conference of Catholic bishops advocates immediately suspending accused priests. But that is a recommendation, not a requirement.

(voice-over): David Clohessy, abused as a boy by his parish priest, now helps other deal with their pain. He says if the church is slow to take action, others should.

CLOHESSY: While we have not been able to make a lot of headway in terms of changing the behavior of bishops, we think that some of the secular authorities can step up to the plate and really play a good role to protect kids.

LANE: Of the nation's 40,000 priests, only a tiny fraction have been accused of wrongdoing. But in the church's own words, the damage is immeasurable.

Hillary Lane, for CNN, New York.

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