Too many Catholic leaders have treated Archbishop Theodore McCarrick’s alleged crimes as an isolated issue. Cardinal Donald Wuerl told an interviewer: “I don’t think this is some massive, massive crisis.”
Bishop Robert Barron has said that any suggestion of widespread corruption is “deeply unjust”. Such claims miss the point. Men at the highest levels of the Church knew what McCarrick had done and took no action. As a result, the exposure of his crimes has gravely damaged the credibility of the whole hierarchy. If bishops expect to be taken seriously as witnesses to Christ, the crisis is massive indeed.
