Vatican responds to case of child sexual abuse by US priest
(March 26, 2010) The Vatican defended a decision not to laicize a US Catholic priest
who sexually abused up to 200 children, many dearf, despite the recommendation of
his bishop that he be removed from the priesthood. In a statement responding to
a report in the New York Times, Vatican spokesman, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi
said the case of Father Lawrence Murphy of Milwaukee Archdiocese, Wisconsin, was a
"tragic" one that "involved particularly vulnerable victims who suffered terribly
from what he did." During the mid-1970s, some of Father Murphy’s victims reported
his abuse to civil authorities, who investigated him at that time; however, according
to news reports, that investigation was dropped. Fr. Lombardi said that the Vatican’s
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith was not informed of the matter until in
the late 1990s, when Fr. Murphy was elderly and in poor health. The Vatican eventually
suggested that the priest continue to be restricted in ministry instead of being laicized,
and he died four months later. The New York Times article said Vatican decision not
to proceed to a church trial and possible laicization came after the priest wrote
a personal appeal to then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, who was
head of the Vatican's doctrinal congregation at the time. On Thursday, the day the
article was published, members of the Survivors' Network of those Abused by Priests
held a brief demonstration in front of St. Peter’s Basilica, distributing copies of
documents related to the case and calling on the pope to disclose how he and the doctrinal
congregation handled allegations of sexual abuse by priests.