By Michelle Martin
Staff writer

Chicago-area Catholics will get a chance to share their thoughts on the church’s sexual abuse scandal later this month, when the Catholic Lawyers Guild of Chicago hosts a series of public hearings on the issue.

Dates, times and places for the hearings were expected to be announced by May 12, but were not available when The Catholic New World went to press.

David Hartigan, the guild’s president, said the organization plans to give Cardinal George a report on the hearings before the cardinal leaves for the June 13-15 U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops meeting in Dallas.

Responding to the sex-abuse crisis is expected to top the agenda for that national meeting, following the April trip to Rome by American cardinals to meet with Pope John Paul II over the issue.

In a related matter, Cook County State’s Attorney Richard Devine and Cardinal George met to discuss the issue of clerical sex abuse. Devine issued a statement praising the cooperation the archdiocese has given.

Also, the Illinois Senate’s Judiciary Committee was expected to meet May 8 to hold hearings on Sen. Dan Cronin’s bill to make clergy mandated reporters of child sexual abuse and to extend the statute of limitations for prosecuting adults who abuse minors.

Guild members were working the first week of May to find attorneys willing to volunteer as hearing officers, court reporters to take down statements and places to hold the hearings. Hearing officers will not necessarily be guild members, or even Catholic.

“This is going to be as open as we can make it,” Hartigan said.

In order to have the statements transcribed, a synopsis written and a report ready for the cardinal by early June, the hearings will likely occur in mid-May. Hartigan said he is looking for as many as two dozen locations around the archdiocese, possibly with multiple hearings at each location.

Hartigan volunteered the services of the Catholic Lawyers Guild to hold public hearings when he spoke with the cardinal at the guild’s annual dinner May 1, after Cardinal George told members that he wanted to get input from lay people before the bishops’ meeting.

Cardinal George’s appeal for suggestions and information is one that he has repeated at many public appearances since the clerical sexual abuse scandal took over the headlines this spring, including a session with pastoral center employees and a press conference before the special summit in Rome.

He has also brought up his desire for input from the laity during several television and radio interviews, during which he has explained the Archdiocese of Chicago’s policy for handling allegations of sexual abuse by priests.

Media reports, he said, have not always fully detailed archdiocesan policies. “People should know and understand what our policies are. They don’t,” he said in an interview with The Catholic New World May 3.

The policy, created in 1992, calls for complaints to be taken by an independent review board, a majority of whose members are lay people and which includes either a victim or a victim’s family member and professionals who deal with the issue of sexual abuse. The review board’s administrator—who is mandated to report allegations to state authorities—conducts an investigation to determine whether the allegations can be substantiated, and whether the priest can ever be returned to ministry.

The board also provides everyone who complains with phone numbers for the state’s attorneys’ offices and for the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services.

The policy does not preclude any priest who has every been the subject of a credible allegation of sexual abuse from ever performing any ministry again, but given the current climate, the cardinal has said, that might change.

One group thinks the archdiocese should go much further.

Michael Tario, a Wilmette resident and parishioner at Sts. Faith, Hope and Charity in Winnetka, is part of a group calling itself the Ad Hoc Committee for Prevention of Sex Abuse by Clergy. Members of the group protested outside the Pastoral Center April 29, suggesting that Catholics withhold or reduce their donations until the archdiocese takes a series of steps, starting with an independent examination of all reports of clergy sex abuse going back 40 years. The group’s list of suggestions also includes: making sure all such cases have been turned over to authorities; finding out which clerics have been the subjects of financial settlements for sex abuse and whether they have been allowed to continue in ministry; finding out why in some cases public authorities did not prosecute priests who were the subjects of sex abuse allegations, allowing victims—even those who signed confidentiality agreements—to speak out; and establishing ways to help victims heal.

The archdiocese already does virtually all of what the independent group demanded, responded Chancellor Jimmy Lago in a statement. He noted that archdiocese did review all of its files about clergy sex abuse, going back 40 years, 10 years ago, and made that review available to public authorities. Since then, the review board has notified the state’s attorneys’ offices of sex abuse cases, he wrote. At the same time, Lago is compiling a report on allegations of the sexual abuse of minors from the last 10 years.

Also in 1992, Lago wrote, the archdiocese established an Assistance Ministry to help anyone abused by a priest.

Tario likened financial settlements that come with confidentiality agreements to “hush money,” saying, “If you offer hush money to someone who’s poor, it’s almost like offering them a bribe,” he said.

Lago, who said the archdiocese has paid out $6.7 million over the last 10 years in settlements, counseling and allied administrative costs, noted that the cardinal has repeatedly said publicly that he has no objection to any of the victims discussing the matter publicly, whether or not they signed confidentiality agreements.

Following their May 3 meeting, statements issued by Cardinal George and State’s Attorney Devine said they and high-level staff members had met to make sure that the ongoing working relationship remained cooperative.

“It was a full and open discussion with the cardinal,” Devine said in his statement. “The cardinal is committed to cooperating with our office in any investigation of past or present conduct, and the review of archdiocesan records.”

Cardinal George said Devine’s office has been “a great help” in the review of clerical sexual misconduct files.

Since the scandal began gathering steam during the trial of former Boston priest John Geoghan in January, two Archdiocese of Chicago priests have been removed or restricted from ministry because accusations that they sexually abused minors, both more than 25 years ago. The first, Father Robert Kealy, had been pastor of Sts. Faith, Hope and Charity, Winnetka. Kealy, a former archdiocesan chancellor, allegedly abused a teenager at his first parish assignment, at St. Germaine in Oak Lawn, in the 1970s. The other, Father Richard Fassbinder, retired pastor of Prince of Peace Parish in Lake Villa, also was accused of abusing a teenager in the 1970s. While files were turned over to the Cook and Lake county state’s attorneys, it is unclear if either priest can be prosecuted because of the statute of limitations.

In the neighboring Diocese of Joliet, Franciscan Sister Judith Davies, chancellor, announced May 5 that four priests, including two parish pastors, had been removed from public ministry, because of sexual abuse allegations. The allegations against both Father Donald Pock, who had been pastor of St. Peter Parish in Itasca, and Father John F. Barrett, who had been pastor of Mary Queen of Heaven Parish in Elmhurst, are based on incidents more than 25 years ago. Barrett was placed on temporary administrative leave while the accusation against him is investigated, while Pock was placed on administrative leave.

Also restricted from publicly saying Mass were retired priests Father Lowell Fisher, who was serving as chaplain for retired sisters at St. Francis Convent in Frankfort, Ill., and Father Edward Poff, who had been assisting at several parishes. The allegation against Fisher involves incidents reported in the 1970s, while the allegation against Poff was reported in 1994. Poff was removed from ministry, received therapy, and then was returned to restricted ministry, according to Davies’ statement.

The dismissals brought to 10 the total number of priests removed from ministry by Joliet Bishop Joseph L. Imesch in the past five weeks.