California abuse ease settlement.

Los Angeles -- The civil case, including personal testimony from abuse victims, was due to open in a Los Angeles court on the morning of Monday, July 17, 2007, but late Saturday night a settlement was reached between lawyers for the plaintiffs and officials of the archdiocese of Los Angeles. The deal reached with 508 people claiming abuse by clergy amounts to approximate U.S. $1 million per person, for a total of U.S. $660 million.

Cardinal Roger Mahony made a public apology for "this horrible sin and crime." However, this last minute settlement, after five years of fighting it, avoided him having to give testimony in court.

According to some, many L.A. Catholics feel Cardinal Mahony, and other Church officials, ought to be held personally to account; these officials have been accused of concealing knowledge of the abuse in a number of parishes and of moving priests around after inadequate counseling treatment. The Cardinal has been criticized also for his resistance and reluctance to co-operate with abuse investigations over the past five years.

The U.S. $660 million payout is the largest settlement amount agreed to by any Catholic diocese since the abuse scandals surfaced in 2002. Forty percent of the total awarded will go to pay for fees to the victims' lawyers. $250 million is to be paid by the archdiocese, partly from property sales and asset liquidation, $227 million by insurers, and the remainder from religious orders and "other sources." The cardinal has claimed that the payout will not require him to eliminate any "core" activities or to sell churches or schools. Criminal investigations into individual child molestation charges are still ongoing, although several of the alleged perpetrators have since died. In the meantime several hundred millions have already gone to pay the Archdiocese lawyers.

The L.A. settlement, when added to other payouts over the past five years in particular Boston's U.S. $85 million, has cost the U.S. Catholic Church two billion. Half of this will have to come from L.A. with, at least some from the contributions of individual parishioners, a "high price," says Peter J. Smith of LifeSiteNews (July 16, 2007), "for their bishops' toleration of infidelity to Catholic teaching among the clergy." Smith also mentions that the "trail of abuse" leads to St. John's Seminary, Camarillo. Of its 1966 and 1972 ordination classes "an incredible one third of graduates" were later accused of molestation.

In 2002, Cardinal Mahony was among those urging Boston's Cardinal Bernard Law to resign. Now Catholics, including Phil Lawler, editor of Catholic World News, think Cardinal Mahony should follow suit.

Lawler argues that while the primary blame rests on the molesting priests, the blame should be shared by the bishops who protected them. Cardinal Mahony's main aim and object seems to have been to avoid the disclosure of embarrassing information. This will now be unavoidable because part of the settlement includes the opening of the L.A. chancery files. Aside from this, claims Lawler, "the cardinal's own credibility is in shreds." He should get out and make way for a bishop who will put the needs of the faithful and fidelity to the Church and its teachings ahead of personal interests. (CWNews.com, July 17, 2007).