“Many abusive priests, like the one above, have voluntarily left or been removed from the priesthood, which begs the question, who is monitoring them now? The answer: nobody.”

The parents of boys who accused a priest of sexual abuse wrote to the Chicago Archdiocese more than two decades ago: ‘Your repeatedly asking ‘what do we want’? is one more insult. ‘What we want’ should be totally obvious. We want something done about these priests.’

“Next week, June 15, marks the 25th anniversary of the Archdiocese of Chicago’s announcement of the intent to create a review board to remove priests, such as the one mentioned by the parents. While publicly available files clearly document that church officials knew about the priest’s behavior since at least the late 1980s, they did not report him to the authorities or remove him from ministry.

“It was not until 2005 that the priest resigned from being a pastor and moved to a ‘monitored’ setting. Two years afterwards, the priest had a young relative stay in his bedroom overnight while the priest’s monitor was out of the country. After this incident occurred, the archdiocese began the process of laicization, or removing him from the priesthood.

“Many abusive priests, like the one above, have voluntarily left or been removed from the priesthood, which begs the question, who is monitoring them now? The answer: nobody.”

By Nicole Sotelo, National Catholic Reporter — Read more …