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WORCESTER (MA)
Telegram & Gazette

Kathleen A. Shaw
TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

Reaction was mixed yesterday to the resignation of Frank Keating as chairman of the National Catholic Review Board, the group charged with overseeing implementation of the church's policy against sexual abuse.

Mr. Keating himself defiantly took another swipe at some Roman Catholic bishops yesterday, defending his comments that compared church leaders to the mafia as he officially resigned as head of a panel keeping tabs on the prelates' sex abuse reforms.

"My remarks, which some bishops found offensive, were deadly accurate. I make no apology," the former Oklahoma governor wrote in his resignation letter to Bishop Wilton Gregory, president of the U.S. hierarchy.

"To resist grand jury subpoenas, to suppress the names of offending clerics, to deny, to obfuscate, to explain away; that is the model of a criminal organization, not my church."

However, Mr. Keating added that "most of America's bishops are fully supportive" of the reform campaign and "have stood up for virtue." He also praised Gregory personally.

"You are a model of the Good Shepherd," he said.

Timothy P. Staney of Worcester, who alleges he was sexually abused as a boy and teenager by a priest and religious education teacher, reacted sharply to the news of Mr. Keating's resignation, and his comparison of the church to the Mafia.

"I have personally seen an instruction from an official of the Vatican, Cardinal Ratzinger, which instructed all bishops of the Catholic Church worldwide to characterize the criminal sexual assault of minors along with violation of the sacraments of the church and thereafter to handle those crimes under the rubric of the pontifical secret," he said.

"While Gov. Keating may have been speaking metaphorically, the Ratzinger conduct is not a metaphor. It is criminal obstruction of justice on an international scale. At least the mafia doesn't claim to be acting in God's interests," Mr. Staney said.

Philip de Albuquerque, president of Speak Truth to Power, said people who know of the crimes committed against children by clergy can "tell the truth, do something about it and support the victims, or bury your head in the sand and play ignorant."

Mr. de Albuquerque was among the group that organized demonstrations in front of St. Paul's Cathedral in Worcester in an unsuccessful quest to open records of the Worcester Diocese on how it has handled sexual abuse allegations.

Posted by Kathy Shaw at 9:11 AM on Jun. 17, 2003

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