Inquirer on Philadelphia Cover-Up: Textbook Illustration

In a statement entitled "Couldn't Shred the Truth," the Philadelphia Inquirer editorializes yesterday about evidence produced in the trial of Msgr. William Lynn that Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua and other church officials shredded documents proving sexual abuse of minors by priests.  As the Inquirer notes, the clinching evidence produced by Lynn's defenders that there has, indeed, been a cover-up in the Philadelphia archdiocese now becomes a "textbook illustration" of what sexual abuse victims have been up against all along as they have sought truth and justice from the Catholic church.

The editorial states, 

Just as two Philadelphia grand juries concluded, Bevilacqua's reported 1994 shredding directive, brought to light only last week, appears to confirm that there was a carefully orchestrated effort by Archdiocese of Philadelphia officials to shield predators. 

Similarly, it has been revealed that Bevilacqua joined with other Pennsylvania bishops "to examine how the dioceses . . . can better protect their secret archives from civil-law discovery," according to court records. 

By hiding the truth from parishioners and police long after it was possible to prosecute alleged crimes, due to limitations statutes, the apparent church cover-up denied victims justice in the criminal courts.

As I noted recently, one of the lessons I draw from the revelation of Cardinal Bevilacqua's engineering a cover-up in Philadelphia is that the Catholic church officials and their attorneys now hounding SNAP in Missouri are hardly on the side of the angels.  I am not inclined to give church officials in Missouri and their hired legal guns the benefit of the doubt in their legal attack on SNAP.

To the contrary: the story emerging in Philadelphia is so uncannily like the story that has emerged in diocese after diocese everywhere in the world, as we've begun to obtain bits and pieces of information about the abuse crisis (much remains hidden by church officials), that it's impossible to avoid concluding that there has been an orchestrated cover-up from the very top of the church.

And the work that SNAP and survivors' advocacy groups do is desperately needed to continue prying the lid off the cover-up.  Though these groups work against great odds, given the wealth, power, and wiliness of the Catholic church in its official face.