Portland’s Former Bishop Makes NYT

• PEDO-BISH: ONCE A PORTLAND BISH

I like to think there’s an angel singing a song in heaven, every time the New York Times covers something other than Portland’s sustainable vegan rug weaving scene. It’s been a good few weeks for negative East Coast coverage in general, what with the Reed College hoo-ha over Renn Fayre, and now this:

Cardinal Has a Mixed Record on Sexual Abuse Cases
…
For eight strenuous hours, the cardinal was pressed to explain why he had decided to return priests who were confirmed sexual abusers back to ministry. He acknowledged that he had failed to notify the authorities of allegations of abuse. He struggled to recall why he had chosen not to share information with parishioners.
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The questions related to abuse cases that Cardinal Levada dealt with while he was an American bishop; he oversaw the archdioceses of Portland and San Francisco from 1986 to 2005. But by the time the questions were being asked, the cardinal had assumed an exalted position at the Vatican just vacated by his old friend Pope Benedict XVI, as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

That put him in charge of adjudicating sexual abuse cases involving priests worldwide, as Benedict had been before him. And like Benedict, whose handling of delicate cases before he became pope has come under scrutiny, Cardinal Levada often did not act as assertively as he could have on abuse cases.