The Roman Catholic Church received another black eye this week when it was revealed that the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, was in charge of orchestrating a plan to pay priests embroiled in sexual scandal to leave the church when he was Archbishop of Milwaukee.
The Archdiocese of Milwaukee faced so many lawsuits regarding children who were allegedly sexually molested by priests in the Diocese that it filed for bankruptcy.
The plan to pay priests to leave in order to quiet the scandal was revealed last week as part of a federal settlement between the Diocese and individuals seeking redress for sexual abuse committed by numerous church officials.
Not only do the documents indicate that Dolan was involved in the plan to pay off priests to gain their silence, but they also indicate that he was in charge of a Vatican-approved plan to shift more than $50 million in church funds into a trust account in order to protect the church’s assets from being seized during bankruptcy proceedings.
Although many critics say that the Diocese also transferred priests to other locations rather than reporting them to the police when sexual misconduct was uncovered, Dolan did not seem to be part of that transfer plan.
