Pope Prevented Defrocking Of Convicted Pedophile Priest

Four years after a priest who was a convicted child molester asked to be defrocked, his bishop pleaded with the future Pope Benedict XVI to remove the man from the priesthood. The Pope refused.

Pope prevented defrocking of abusive priest
Letter from 1985 shows future pontiff refused to remove California priest convicted of child molestation, wrote 'good of Universal Church' must be considered
Associated Press

Four years after a California priest and convicted child molester asked to be defrocked, his bishop pleaded with the future Pope Benedict XVI to remove the man from the priesthood. Then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger replied, urging caution.

"Consider the good of the Universal Church," Ratzinger wrote in a 1985 letter to Oakland Bishop John Cummins. "It is necessary for this Congregation to submit incidents of this sort to very careful consideration, which necessitates a longer period of time."

Two more years would pass before the Vatican acted on the Rev. Stephen Kiesle's request to leave.
A copy of the letter, typewritten in Latin and signed by Ratzinger, was obtained by The Associated Press. It constitutes the strongest challenge yet to the Vatican's insistence that Benedict played no role in blocking the removal of pedophile priests during his years as head of the Catholic Church's doctrinal watchdog office.

The letter is part of years of correspondence beginning in 1981 between the diocese of Oakland and the Vatican about Kiesle, who pleaded no contest to misdemeanors involving child molestation in 1978.

The case then languished for four years at the Vatican before Ratzinger finally wrote to the Oakland bishop. It was two more years before Kiesle was removed; during that time he continued to do volunteer work with children through the church.

In the November 1985 letter, Ratzinger says the arguments for removing Kiesle were of "grave significance" but added that such actions required very careful review and more time. He also urged the bishop to provide Kiesle with "as much paternal care as possible" while awaiting the decision, according to a translation for AP by Professor Thomas Habinek, chairman of the University of Southern California Classics Department.

Lena, the Vatican attorney, said "paternal care" was a way of telling the bishop he was responsible for keeping Kiesle out of trouble. Lena said Kiesle was not accused of any child abuse in the 5 1/2 years it took for the Vatican to act on the laicization.

The future pope also noted that any decision to defrock Kiesle must take into account the "good of the Universal Church" and the "detriment that granting the dispensation can provoke within the community of Christ's faithful, particularly considering the young age." Kiesle was 38 at the time.

Kiesle had been sentenced in 1978 to three years' probation after pleading no contest to misdemeanor charges of lewd conduct for tying up and molesting two young boys in a San Francisco Bay area church rectory.

Cummins, the bishop, told the Vatican that the priest took a leave of absence and met with a therapist and his probation officer during the three years. It's not clear from the file where Kiesle lived during those years, but Cummins mentions temporary assignments in neighboring dioceses that never worked out.

As his probation ended in 1981, Kiesle asked to leave the priesthood and the diocese submitted papers to Rome to defrock him.

California church officials wrote to Ratzinger at least three times to check on the status of Kiesle's case and Cummins discussed the case with officials during a Vatican visit, according to correspondence. At one point, a Vatican official wrote to say the file may have been lost and suggested resubmitting materials.

Kiesle was ultimately laicized on Feb. 13, 1987, though the documents do not indicate how or why. They also don't say what role, if any, Ratzinger had in the decision.

 

Kiesle, who married after leaving the priesthood, was arrested and charged in 2002 with 13 counts of child molestation from the 1970s. All but two were thrown out after the US Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional a California law extending the statute of limitations.

He pleaded no contest in 2004 to a felony for molesting a young girl in his Truckee home in 1995 and was sentenced to six years in state prison.

Kiesle, now 63 and a registered sex offender, lives in a Walnut Creek gated community, according to his address listed on the state's sex registry. An AP reporter was turned away when attempting to reach him for comment.

Comments

[Maskil]

He wanted to remove the priest as well, but the beloved John Paul II vetoed any futher action for fear in would draw too much attention to the matter. But the media prefers to villify Ratzinger and deify his predecessor, who knew and concealed much more than the new "zero-tolerance" Pontiff. They're just not ready to face the truth about John Paul II.

[harold]

This is a story about Orthodox Judaism?

[Dr. Dave]

This is a story about Orthodox Judaism?

Look at the picture. Benedict is wearing a yarmulke. The yarmulke is white and he's wearing a kittel so the photo might have been taken on Rosh Hashana.

[oh brother]

This is very sloppy reporting. The abuser was already removed from serving as a priest by the diocese of Oakland, but the diocese somehow didn't keep him from "volunteering" as a layman. Contrary to this article, "defrocking" was not at issue. Defrocking is a canonical punishment and requires a canonical trial. The CDF and Ratzinger were not handling abuse cases in the 1980s. This priest was requesting a dispensation from his vows of celebacy aka being laicized, which is not a punishment. The Vatican policy at the time was not to grant dispensation requests to any priests under the age of 40. The abuser was only 38. That's the reason for the Latin form letter with Ratzinger's signature and the reason why the request was granted two years later. This article fails to mention this policy and gives the impression that Ratzinger specially composed the letter for the occasion.

Shame on the local authorities for only giving the guy 3 years probation for tying up and molesting boys. Shame on the Oakland diocese for not stopping him from "volunteering" after they removed him from his priestly functions. What does Pope Benedict have to do with all of this? The lawyer who provided this letter to the New York Times and the AP can't sue the government and can't get much money from the Oakland diocese because of financial restructuring so he's going for a bigger fish, the Vatican.

Maskil, I completely agree with you about JPII vs Ratzinger. Ratzinger was the first cardinal to recognize the severity of the abuse scandal and implement changes, even if those reforms were too slow. The media is out for this pope and they are missing the real Vatican sex scandal unfolding about Marcial Maciel. Unfortunately for reporters, Ratzinger was not implicated in that scandal but JPII was.

To the author of this blog, there is a lot of poor quality journalism about Catholicism. Sometimes it's because reporters have an ax to grind, but mostly it's ignorance. To the extent that you are interested in the Catholic abuse scandal and the Vatican, the most respected and accurate reporting on the Vatican is by John L. Allen, Jr.

[Jakes]

This is a story about Orthodox Judaism?
Posted by: harold

Honestly Harold, I think you'd complain if you had nothing to complain about.

[R]

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20100411/tuk-pope-has-no-uk-arrest-immunity-6323e80.html

[steve]

It is impossible to dismiss the obvious parallels with Orthodox Jewish leaders who have behaved the same way as Benedict. Kisdom Hayeenu Kaamora Daminu! We have become just like them! All those "leaders" that are still advocating similar policies of sweeping these cases under the rug are the talmidim of these popes.

[Robert Wisler]

Oakland bishop Cummins is a truly righteous man if this article is to be believed.

Maskil, I hope that you're correct as to Ratzinger's innocence in the matter of the pedophile coverup.

Pope Benedict's desire to reverse the liturgical abuses of Vatican II is a righteous endeavor (although outside the realm of this blog).

However, it's overshadowed by scandals such as this one. I hope that the Pope is innocent of any part of the pedophile priest scandal. However, articles such as this one seem to point the finger at the current Pope. I hope that they are wrong.

[Maskil]

Robert,

I wouldn't use the word "innocent," probably not for anyone. He did know. However, when he made attempts to do something about it his wings were clipped by John Paul II, who according to church doctrine is the successor to Peter (and thus to Jesus). So yeah, he knew, but John Paul always knew "better," and Ratzinger's requests and recommendations for action were limited by the Pope if not ignored.

If he had the power to break the story wide open and take down the entire Catholic Church without doing more damage than good (i.e. making the world ultimately a better place with less child abuse) while going against everything he believed in, well, I don't think any one is to judge but God.

If you keep up with these stories as they just come out you'll see that aside from the some stuff that was related to the Irish Catholic Church, which the kept from being reported all the way up, he did know just about every detail. While the Vatican made some initial release of this information, Benedict has been very implicit that he does not intend to slander the name of JPII just to defend himself. If the media continues to villify him he's gonna let it happen at this point.

I just wanted to point out that in all these cases the true villian is John Paul II and that Benedict always felt more should be done but was held back, and now his policies show he meant everything he recommended. I don't know why, but the media is having some super love affair with JPII while it tries to take down Benedict. Those with more integrity should not perpetuate this line of inconsistancy.

You're aware that 14 year old boys sometimes are tried and sentenced as adults and end up in maximum security prisons in the US. You're also aware of what happens to them. The guards know, the warden knows, the sentencing judge knows, the prosecutor knows, the arresting cops know, the governor knows, the president knows and the electorate of the US all knows. What have you done to stop it? Given that you live in a democracy founded on civil rights and human rights while Ratzinger was working within a dictatorial theocracy, I'm inclined to judge your personal lack of action before I judge his.

But look, I'm Jewish and I can't weigh the good of the Catholic Church in this world to the bad, and I don't know how much child abuse its enormous reaches prevents from what "normal levels" in the world at large would otherwise be. Maybe he "followed orders" just like a Nazi soldier, but I don't have the knowledge capacity to understand the severity of that type of crime either. Soldiers need to follow orders, but I've seen in Israel the types of atrocities it can bring when they don't. I've also seen how a political machine can control and limit free thinking and individual action, and I know of Jews who had to bury living Jews in Aushwitz when a gun was at their head but who knew that Jewish philosophy prohibits committing murder to save one's own life (and they had to live with that guilt till their deaths). So I'm passing on information, not judgement.

[Robert Wisler]

Maskil,
Thank you for clarifying the story for me. I had never read ANYTHING during this entire scandal in which John Paul II was implicated in ANY way in covering up this stuff.

As I understand it, Cardinal Ratzinger reported the scandal, let his opinion of "bring down the bastard" be known, but was subject to the dictums of his superiors (ie: John Paul II) from taking the appropriate action against this priest from Oakland.

[pierre]

http://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/otn.cfm?id=632&repos=6&subrepos=5&searchid=646332