AS I PREDICTED....

Two independent news organizations have confirmed that the Attorney General of New York State is in the process of preparing for a State-wide Grand Jury to investigate sexual abuse by Priests and cover ups by Bishops.

There are 8 dioceses in the State of New York, including the Archdiocese of New York.  

State-wide there are  approximately 7.3 million Catholics.

New York State Attorney General Barbara Underwood, has directed the Criminal Division within her office to reach out to local District Attorneys — who are the only entities that currently have the power to convene a grand jury to investigate these matters — in order to establish a partnership on this issue.

As I have written in previous articles on this blogsite, I believe it will be just a matter of a short time when grand juries will be convened in every State — an idea that is growing in acceptance and enthusiasm.

Illinois State Supreme Court Justice Anne Burke, who was a member of the 2002 U.S. bishops' National Review Board, stated:  "I think every State should convene a grand jury into this culture of secrecy that protected offenders at all costs."

The State of Nebraska announced that is preparing for the possible convening of its own grand jury. This as a result of revelations of homosexual predation on seminarians in the Diocese of Lincoln.

The 8 Dioceses of New York are Albany, Brooklyn, Buffalo, New York, Ogdensburg, Rochester, Rockville Centre and Syracuse.

In the case of the Diocese of Albany, Bishop Howard Hubbard is alleged to have engaged in homosexual activity with Thomas Zalay who, at the age of 25, committed suicide.  

In a letter, Zalay wrote that Bishop Hubbard justified his homosexual assaults by suggesting the Bible defined celibacy as being free of sexual contact with women; therefore, according to the Bishop, homosexual acts were not to be considered sinful.

Zalay wrote that  he regarded homosexual acts as sinful. He did not consider himself a homosexual and wanted to get away from Bishop Hubbard. The only way to escape him, he concluded, was suicide. Zalay set himself on fire at his parents' home.

In the nearby Diocese of Rochester, Matthew Clark was Bishop from 1979 to 2012, largely overlapping Bishop Hubbard's time in Albany. In fact, Bishops Hubbard and Clark were known to be close associates. 

As a point of interest, then-Father Matthew Clark was the Spiritual Director during my years in seminary at the North American College in Rome.

Bishop Clark's longstanding embrace of homosexuality earned him a public rebuke from then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who castigated him for supporting homosexuality.

In a well-publicized case in the 1990s, Bishop Clark had allowed Father Jim Callan to conduct same-sex weddings until the Vatican discovered and suspended him. 

In 2002, Bishop Clark was threatened with threatened with a lawsuit for sex abuse cover-up.

Depositions indicate that Bishop Clark had allowed three Priests to remain in active ministry for decades in spite of multiple credible allegations of abuse of teenaged boys.

The Archdiocese of New York, home to almost half the Catholics in the whole State, has a history of homosexual abuse and cover up. 

At least 80 Priests stretching all the way back to Cardinal Spellman's tenure have been publicly accused of sexual abuse of minors — most of them of males.

Attorney General Underwood has publicly vowed to employ whatever authority she has to encourage and actively participate in a State-wide investigation within the State of New York.

We can only expect that other States will quickly follow and the impact upon the Church and the Catholic faithful will be devastating.

Let us hope that Pope Francis will see the gravity of the looming catastrophe facing the Church and immediately intervene, taking decisive actions against those who have perpetrated these terrible acts and those who abetted them by their silence.