Monsignor William J. Lynn of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia has managed to do what no other Catholic leader in America has done.
He’s gotten himself convicted of child endangerment.
William Lynn has become the first ranking Catholic cleric in the United States to be convicted of a crime in relation to the Vatican’s ongoing child sex abuse scandal.
Lynn hasn’t been convicted of molestation, mind you, only endangerment – a subtle but almost entirely irrelevant difference.
Way to go Will. Accountability: a historic first for the Catholic Church.
Essentially, Lynn, acting in his capacity as a Philadelphia area monsignor (a sort of divinely ordained mid-level human resources manager) shuffled predatory priests away from the accusing eyes of suspicious congregations.
A nurturing spirit is a good trait in a religious leader, and Father Lynn was very good at protecting his flock.
Not the abused and molested children so much – he kind of dropped the ball there – but he totally had the three dozen priests accused of sex crimes in his area covered.
Which, as it turns out, was pretty easy for him.
As one of his duties as a monsignor and senior aide to the late Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua (may he rest in…abjet discomfort), Lynn was in charge of identifying and dealing with child-molesting priests.
Apparently “identifying” and “dealing with” carry entirely different meanings in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.
Lynn is not the first priest to go down since this entire horrific episode first began, but he is the first senior Catholic clergyman to be convicted of an abuse-related crime.
The conviction of Lynn has sent shockwaves through the American religious community.
Why the prosecution and conviction of a man who aided and abetted child molesters is shocking, I am not entirely sure.
I was always under the impression sending pedophiles and their protectors to prison was pretty much an indisputably good thing.
Maybe the shock comes from the perceived invulnerability of the Catholic leadership thus far.
Most sex abuse cases in the U.S. have ended with out-of-court settlements and a quick trip to a Catholic-run psychiatric center for perverted pastors.
After which the sometimes-defrocked priests have been either stripped of their ministerial duties and allowed to roam free, or – should they have kept their white collars through a process of chuch supervised rehabilitation – have been shuffled off to distant monastaries away from small children and the media.
Many victims of church-related abuse are hoping this conviction will open the doors for more cases against even higher-ranking church officials.
To a certain extent, I imagine this has come as a sort of relief to Rome, as it will presumably save them the hassle of having to clean house themselves.
Besides, the Vatican’s entire strategy of paying off victims and their families (in settlements which often run into the millions of dollars) has been putting a heavy burden on many already ailing parishes around the world.
This new tactic of simply letting their priests get caught and go to prison might seem pretty fiscally sound, but greedy, self centered victims will probably still demand financial compensation for their decades of torment and nightmare-like abuse.
On the bright side, it’ll be much cheaper simply letting local prosecutors do all the investigating and convicting, and probably more effective too – if William Lynn’s record has anything to say about it.
Nicholas Pierce is a 22-year old history senior from Baton Rouge, follow him on twitter @TDR_nabdulpierc.