Friday, March 30, 2007

The Fr. Foley Scandal

The Hartford Courant this week exposed the scandal that the Rev. Stephen Foley--a former police chaplain whom the Archdiocese banned from public ministry 14 years ago due to suspected sexual abuse of young boys--was still driving a black Crown Victoria equipped with emergency lights and similar police car-type accessories. The Crown Victoria is the official car of the state police and Foley's accusers say it was how he lured his victims. The Archdiocese paid $850,000 to one of Foley's accusers in 2002 and settled 43 abuse cases--2 of which involved accusations against Foley--for 22 million dollars in 2005. But until the Courant ran its stories this week Foley was still driving that car while living at St. Thomas Seminary in Bloomfield.

To read the Courant's full coverage go here.

43 comments:

Anonymous said...

Foley was allowed such freedom by Cronin, it's to bad Archbishop Mansell has to look bad for the sake of Cronin and his ego. Our listing in last place by Crisis, should also be atributed to Cronin.

Anonymous said...

As to Cronin being part of the problem, I think you're right in suggesting that. He was the worst thing that could have happened to the Archdiocese of Hartford. When I lived outside the diocese and mentioned the Archdiocese of Hartford, people would not speak of all the good things that the produced by it: the saintliness of Venerable Michael J. McGivney, the pioneering and fearless leadership of Archbishops Henry J. O'Brien and John F. Whealon, the selfless service of Bishops Shahan and McCormack to CUA, or the research of Msgr. Sokolowski, perhaps the best scholar from the diocese. They would mention Richard McBrien and Archbishop Cronin. They would openly make fun of Cronin and his lackey Msgr. Ginty.

But Cronin's tenure in Hartford was bad. He made enemies across the board. When he arrived in Hartford, he showed a real interesting in accruing the wealth and trappings associated with the episcopate in some dioceses. I am thinking of the mansion and property that William Cardinal O'Connell had accumulated in Boston, where they passed on undisturbed through the tenure of Bernard Cardinal Law. O'Connell's mansion, however, was a gift, not an acquisition. Cronin's desire for these trappings was due in no small part to the fact that Cronin himself was originally a Boston priest and fancied himself as a successor to Humberto Cardinal Medeiros. After it became clear that he would not be the Archbishop of Boston, he attempted to accumulate these trappings in Hartford, throwing prudence to the four winds.

In contrast, Archbishop John F. Whealon made an effort to strip the trappings of wealth from the episcopate, living the same life of evangelical poverty lived by his brother priests. Ultimately, this was a correct thing to do, for adherence to the evangelical counsels helps to foster holiness in a priest. It also was an important witness to Christ's message, ever important in the age of consumerism.

Among the first moves announced by Archbishop Cronin upon his arrival in Hartford was that the archdiocese would acquire a mansion in West Hartford with an in-ground swimming pool in the back yard. Particularly, since this occurred during the recession of the early '90s, it played very poorly in the media. Cronin then fell back upon a second plan, which entailed evicting the Vincentians from the former episcopal mansion on Prospect Avenue. Now I am not one of those people who wants to pull the art and beauty out of churches. But there is a difference between having beauty in the liturgy and accumulating status symbols. It seems a grave disservice to use donor money or the cathedricum (the offertory tax that parishes give to the diocese) to finance the acquisition of unnecessary real property. Such a decision was extremely imprudent given external conditions, especially the recession which started us down the roads of economic problems. It looked especially bad, given that the Archdiocese was not lacking in space to house the Archbishop.

Also Cronin began the slow process of concentrating power his secretary, Msgr. Ginty, or as many call him- "the lackey". Ginty became very powerful through Cronin's cronyism, not merit. The way in which he followed Cronin everywhere made him a laughinstock, especially among extern priests. He had no qualifications to be the Chancellor of the Archdiocese; specifically he had no degree in canon law and no experience with records management.

Controversy further exploded in Cronin's restructuring of the Catholic Transcript. Cronin challenged the desire of staff to investigate and write about the impact of child-sex-abuse scandals on victims in 1994. (He must have been afraid of them finding Fr. Foley.) Then, in an effort to purge the paper of a generally liberal reporting staff and eliminate Richard McBrien's column, Cronin made turned the Transcript into a monthly. I don't mind the effort eliminate the liberals and applaud the decision to dismiss McBrien. These are legitimate administrative decisions. Despite these legitimate desires, they were achieved through imprudent means. By transforming The Transcript into a monthly Cronin eliminated the only effective means of timely communication between the archbishop and the faithful. This has much to do with the current state of conditions. With the switch to monthly publication, the Transcript became little more than Cronin's photo album, a nickname deservedly earned due to the lack of substantive articles and columns about issues facing the church. (Msgr. Liptak has done a lot to fix it- but there's still work and it really still should be a weekly.) The main stage manager and director of this soap opera was Rev. John Gatzak, who used his position as editor of the Catholic Transcript to curry favor with the Archbishop, leading to his current appointment as archdiocesan communications director and head honcho of the office of Radio and TV. Downsizing the Transcript was an incredibly myopic solution, and has much to do with the current problems that result largely from a failure to evangelize by Archbishop Cronin.

Archbishop Cronin also effectively alienated the permanent deacons of the diocese by moving them around in the same way priests are moved. Such a policy ignored the nature of the permanent diaconate. Now this practice of moving permanent deacons occurs in no other American diocese. It has no canonical basis, and resulted from an "innovative approach" that the Archdiocese thought it would "pioneer". The permanent deacons had lived in the parish they were ordained to serve, often for twenty to thirty years and established deep roots in the parish. They seemed fairly secure because the canons defining the territorial nature of parishes are located in the book dealing with the discipline of clerics and specifically mandate that clerics assigned to a parish be located within it. Traditionally, involvement in parish life, in addition to sacramental ministry, had been an important aspect of the ministry of permanent deacons. An issue unaddressed and unresolved by such a policy was that often the wives and children of permanent deacons would simultaneously be involved in the same parish. Would they be required to transfer their involvement to the new parish, if their husband or father were reassigned? Such a mandate would not comport with the voluntary nature of membership in a parish or the larger ecclesiological idea that a parish is a community of believers. Since no such mandate was explicitly expressed, it would seem that not to be required. On the other side, if the rest of a deacon's family is involved in the parish he was ordained to serve, it dulls the reach and power of his ministry outside of the liturgy, especially if he does not reside in the parish he is assigned to. This unnecessarily complicates the life of the permanent deacon, with no explicit telos to the practice. Traditionally, permanent deacons have made significant contributions to evangelization through their involvement in the parish outside the liturgy. This program also raised unnecessary controversy and resentment in the parishes, on the part of parishoners who had come to value the ministy of permanent deacons. Many of the permanent deacons had established deep roots in the parishes, never thinking there might be a day they'd be sent elsewhere. It seems that this program has been quietly and ignominiously phased out by the Archdiocese, as the negative implications became apparent.

Finally, Archbishop Cronin effectively alienated the traditionalists. One particularly galling issue was his refusal to allow the weekly celebration of the Tridentine Mass in Hartford, the metropolitan city of our province. This was painful for the faithful residing in Litchfield and Hartford Counties, because the only weekly Tridentine Mass was in New Haven, creating a drive of more than an hour each way. Despite letters and petitions, Archbishop Cronin refused to allow the expansion of this rite and did not invite in the FSSP or ICR, who have a track record of restoring dying urban parishes.

Mansell has done much to restore things in the diocese. That said, it is truly yeoman's work that faces him. I credit Mansell for putting Ginty in his place- reappointment to Our Lady of Loretto in Waterbury.

I think that Mansell has made some measurable improvements- allowing the Latin Mass in New Britain, bringing more competent people in to run the chancery. That said, his strength, as he will freely admit, is with money: fundraising, budgeting, and managing it. The Annual Appeal has improved, consequently. As a sometimes communicant at the archbishop's daily Mass, I can also state with confidence that he is truly priestly in his temperament- a man dedicated to prayer and the sacraments. I respect him and what he is trying to do in the diocese.

That said, the clear need in our diocese is evangelization. We need someone like John Cardinal O'Connor, who very effectively used media to communicate the Christian message. Supposedly, Archbishop O'Brien's name was also on the terna for Hartford in 2003. Given the desperate need for evangelization, O'Brien would have been a better pick, given his intellect, wit, and public speaking skills. Part of the decision resulted from the fact that Mansell had grown tired and distant in Buffalo and was disappointed at being passed over for appointment to New York. Incidentally, rumor has it that Mansell is among the names on the new terna for New York. I do not what, if any influence Cardinal Egan will have in the matter. Story has it that when Cardinal O'Connor got wind that he might be succeeded by Egan, he stopped chemotherapy and flew to Rome to beg John Paul II not to send Egan to New York. O'Connor had reluctantly accepted Egan as his auxiliary in the late '80s after Joseph Cardinal Bernardin refused to have him as an auxiliary in Chicago. Egan made his name as a canonist in drafting the 1983 Code of Canon Law. John Paul had wanted to reward him. Sadly, he did not understand that despite having Roman experience, Egan was a bad fit for the East Coast, primarily due to his lack of media saavy. Part of this also has to do with the fact that Apostolic Nuncio to the U.S. had been a patronage job for long time. Consequently, the nunciature was asleep at the wheel in alerting the Holy See on these issues. I think the desire to reward Egan combined with the poor financial condition of the archdiocese prompted John Paul to appoint him.

Regardless, I think that the key to turning things around has to be a program of evangelization involving aggressive advertising, better media relations by the archdiocese and better use of new media. Such a campaign needs to fearlessly proclaim the Word of God, and not be afraid to explain the Truth in all its beauty and complexity. For this, Archbishop Mansell needs to surround himself with aides better equipped for this challenge.

First and foremost, we must say our prayers for the priests and the faithful in the archdiocese.

Anonymous said...

There are bunch of factors causing the last place listing in Crisis. Their methodology is extremely flawed- if you look at the metrics that they used, they looked specifically at a number of faith events that predominantly occur in Catholics in their twenties. Thus, larger economic trends, such as the massive flight of people in their twenties, largely due to the twinning of poor economic conditions and few economic opportunities (a problem in part caused by the state income tax and dysfunctional governance system) especially hurt the Archdiocese of Hartford in the Crisis study.

If you think about it- the number of adult initiations is going to be low in a state where the vast majority of Christians are Catholic, as compared to a state like Texas, where there are many non-Catholic Christians. Let's face it- the majority of adult initiations people who are already baptized as Christians entering into full communion with the Catholic Church. Most adult initiations happen between the ages of 20-35, often as part of the process of new family formation. Similarly, a diocese that has seen its cohort of candidates for the priesthood decrease as part of a larger flight by young professionals from their homeland, will see a decrease in ordination candidates commensurate with such a trend. And so if you look at the study, you'll see that right behind the Archdiocese of Hartford is the Diocese of Rockville Center. There the issue is not economic malaise- but explosive growth that has forced young professionals into the outer boroughs and Jersey. This is the other issue- the makeup of both the Archdiocese of Hartford and Diocese of Rockville Center is predominantly suburban. Generally there is little rental housing and starter housing in the suburbs- the kind of housing that attracts folks in their twenties like me. Think about it- no one graduating college with mountains of debt could afford Long Island real estate, unless they're living at home. So the Crisis study is a racket.

James B. from Enfield

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