Los Angeles archbishop describes city's clergy sex abuse files as 'sad and evil'

Church leaders read letter at masses across the city after Jose Gomez strips predecessor of his administrative duties

Roman Catholic parishioners in Los Angeles were read a letter from Archbishop Jose Gomez on Sunday in which he described newly released files on clergy sex abuse as "terribly sad and evil."

The archbishop's words were read by church leaders at masses across the city, the Los Angeles Times reported. The letter was made public late last week.
Gomez said the church needs to acknowledge the "terrible failure" of its handling of abuse cases.

At St Charles Borromeo Catholic Church in North Hollywood, parishioner Eric Nielsen praised Gomez for addressing the issue.

"I take my hat off to the archbishop," said Nielsen, 52. "He got on the ball and did what needed to be done."

But Nielsen told the Times he would probably stop attending the church, where he's worshipped since 1981, because he was upset by the child abuse scandal.
"It's a shame," he said.

On Thursday, Gomez stripped his predecessor Cardinal Roger Mahony of his administrative duties for failing to take swift action against abusive priests.

In a letter posted on his personal blog Friday, Mahony challenged Gomez for publicly shaming him and said he developed policies to safeguard children after taking over in 1985, despite being unequipped to deal with the molester priests he inherited.

Mahony had apologized two weeks ago after another release of similar files showed he and other top aides worked behind the scenes to protect the church from the growing scandal, keeping offending clerics out of state and preventing public disclosure of sex crimes committed by priests.

Gomez's rebuke and Mahony's public response was unprecedented because it revealed infighting between two highly placed church leaders in a Roman Catholic hierarchy that rarely break ranks publicly, according to the Rev Thomas Doyle, a canon lawyer who worked for the Vatican's Washington DC embassy.

Following a court order, the church posted on its website tens of thousands of pages of the previously secret personnel files of 122 priests accused of molesting children.

In his letter, Gomez described the latest records to be made public as "brutal and painful reading."

"The behavior described in these files is terribly sad and evil," Gomez wrote. "There is no excuse, no explaining away what happened to these children. The priests involved had the duty to be their spiritual fathers and they failed."

Obama compromises with religious leaders over contraception coverage

Birth control advocates and Catholic groups praise move that allows for exemptions but maintains women's healthcare access

The Obama administration moved to defuse a lingering controversy over the Affordable Care Act on Friday, saying that while religious institutions would not have to pay for contraception, employees would still be guaranteed access to birth control.

The compromise, which expands the field of exemptions to a requirement in the act that employees provide contraception in their insurance plans, was immediately praised by Catholic groups and Planned Parenthood alike.

The one group that has not praised the shift is the insurance lobby. Insurance companies, it appears, will bear the cost of free contraception the church refuses to provide.

"The rules proposed today by HHS appear to go a long way toward rectifying the most problematic provisions of the mandate," said Bill Donohue, head of the Catholic League, in a statement. A related group, Catholics United, echoed the praise, as did Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards.

"This policy delivers on the promise of women having access to birth control without co-pays no matter where they work," Richards said. "This policy makes it clear that your boss does not get to decide whether you can have birth control."

President Barack Obama's 2010 healthcare law requires that businesses cover employees' birth control costs as part of their insurance plans. The law mandates coverage for such birth control measures as sterilization and emergency contraception pills, or so-called "day-after" pills.

The requirement has created a deluge of lawsuits from religious institutions and private businesses with moral objections. At least one of dozens of related lawsuits over the matter appeared likely to land before the US supreme court.

On Friday the Department of Health and Human Services vastly expanded the group of employers who would be eligible for exemptions from the birth control clause. Originally religious institutions did not qualify if they served a large number of people of other faiths. Now any outfit the IRS recognizes as a religious nonprofit qualifies. That includes a large number of Catholic hospitals and universities.

Separate insurance plans would be written to cover contraception for employees of those institutions, the administration announced. For now, it appears, the cost of those plans will fall to insurance companies - although it could eventually fall to taxpayers.

A spokesman for the America's Health Insurance Plans, the main industry lobby, had no immediate comment on the rule change, Bloomberg reported.

The administration has broad latitude in writing rules for how federal regulators must enforce the healthcare law.