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Cover up questions dog presiding bishop: The Church of England Newspaper, November 11, 2011 p 7 November 10, 2011

Posted by geoconger in Abuse, Church of England Newspaper.
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First printed in The Church of England Newspaper.

The president of the Catholic League – an American Roman Catholic pressure group – has denounced Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori for receiving into the priesthood of the Episcopal Church a man dismissed from the Roman Catholic priesthood for having being a sexual abuser.

On 7 November 2011 Bill Donohue of the Catholic League issued a statement saying: “[Bishop] Jefferts Schori, knew about the sexual abuse activities of a homosexual candidate for the Episcopal priesthood, did nothing about it, and indeed allowed him to become a priest.”

Mr Donohue complained that it was “surreal” that activists from the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP) were protesting against the conduct of the Rev Bede Parry – the former Catholic turned Episcopal priest — outside the Roman Catholic Church’s Cathedral in Kansas City. “Why wasn’t it in New York City, home to the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church of the United States? She’s the issue,” Mr Donohue charged.

The protests over Mr Parry came after a statement signed by the retired priest that confessed to his misconduct was posted on the Internet. The confession alleged that Parry’s superiors in the Catholic Church knew of his misconduct as did Bishop Jefferts Schori.

However, The Church of England Newspaper could not confirm the veracity of the confession. Mr Parry’s legal counsel, Joseph Paul Smith, told CEN he had no knowledge of the 7 May 2011 confession and would have to ask his client about the document.

Two charges contained in the document, however, appear to spell trouble for Bishop Jefferts Schori – the bishop who in 2004 received Parry in to the Episcopal Church. The confession states that a copy of a psychological evaluation conducted by a Catholic monastery in 2000 was given to Bishop Jefferts Schori. In his confession, Mr Parry stated the evaluation found he had a “proclivity to reoffend with minors” and was considered grounds for refusing him admission into a California monastery.

Mr Parry also stated the Abbot Gregory Polan of Conception Abbey “would later share the information with” Bishop Jefferts Schori. The Diocese of Nevada had until this time denied any knowledge of this report and has denied its relevance to Mr Parry’s reception as an Episcopal priest.

The confession also states that Parry was dismissed from the priesthood of the Catholic Church in 2002. However, in 2004 Bishop Jefferts Schori received the now laicized priest into the Episcopal Church without re-ordaining him.

A spokesman for the Presiding Bishop declined to comment on the Catholic League’s charges, and referred inquiries to the Diocese of Nevada’s July 2011 statement that a review of its files showed that all of the proper canons were followed in Parry’s process of reception into the Episcopal Church.

All of the instances of abuse committed by Mr Parry occurred when he was a Roman Catholic priest, the Nevada Episcopal statement said, and no evidence exists of misconduct during his service in the Episcopal Diocese of Nevada.

However, canon lawyer Allan Haley said the latest revelations raised the question whether “Bishop Jefferts Schori was made aware of Parry’s cooperative dismissal from his orders in the Catholic Church? And if his prior offences were grounds enough for his dismissal from orders, why were they not likewise grounds for refusing to receive him as a priest in the Episcopal Church?”

Mr Haley noted that under the canons of the Episcopal Church in effect in 2003, Mr Parry was obliged to supply “[e]vidence of previous Ministry and that all other credentials are valid and authentic.”

“How could he have met this requirement if his credentials had been declared invalid by the Catholic Church — with his cooperation and consent,” he asked, adding the “questions for Bishop Jefferts Schori just get curiouser and curiouser.”