Pope John Paul Backed Praise for Hiding Sexual Abuse

One would hope by now that even the most far right Catholics are coming to recognize the reality that the late Pope John Paul II was anything but saintly. Increasingly it is obvious that John Paul not only knew about the sexual abuse of minors, but he aided and abetted predator priests. Moreover, as reported by the New York Times, John Paul II backed those engaged in cover ups that left children and youth at risk. Indeed, rather than being declared a saint, John Paul II should be indicted posthumously as a criminal conspirator who operated a world wide conspiracy involving the sexual abuse of minors. How anyone can view the man as saintly defies belief. Obviously, John Paul II's complicity in the cover ups in no manner excuse Papa Ratzi for his own morally bankrupt behavior in protecting predator priests and delaying removing them from positions where they could prey upon children and youths. As for Catholic apologists who whine that other denominations and public schools, etc., have sexual abuse problems, my response is that no other organization ANYWHERE to date has been documented to have engaged in the type of worldwide, top down directed conspiracy of the type favored by the Catholic Church hierarchy for a half century or more. Here are highlights from the New York Times story:

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A former Vatican cardinal who congratulated a French bishop for hiding a sexually abusive priest has said he acted with the approval of the late Pope John Paul, a Spanish newspaper reported on Saturday. Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos, the Vatican official in charge of priests around the world when he praised the French bishop in 2001, dragged the Polish pope into the controversy during a conference in the Spanish city of Murcia.
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His comment came after a Vatican spokesman indirectly confirmed that a 2001 letter to the bishop posted on a French website on Thursday was authentic and was proof the Vatican was right to tighten up its procedures on sex abuse cases that year. By invoking John Paul, Castrillon Hoyos appeared to up the ante in a subtle Vatican power struggle over who was to blame for past failures to deal effectively with the abuse cases whose revelations in recent months have shaken the Church.

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"After consulting the pope ... I wrote a letter to the bishop congratulating him as a model of a father who does not hand over his sons," the daily La Verdad quoted Castrillon Hoyos as telling the conference on Friday, to a round of applause from the assembled prelates, priests and lay people. "The Holy Father authorized me to send this letter to all bishops in the world and publish it on the internet."
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Castrillon Hoyos's letter, written in French in 2001, praised Bishop Pierre Pican of Bayeux-Lisieux for not denouncing a French priest who was later sentenced to 18 years in jail for the repeated rape of a boy and sexual assaults on 10 others. Pican, who received a suspended three-month jail sentence for not denouncing sexual abuse of minors, admitted in court he had kept Rev. Rene Bissey in parish work despite the fact the priest had privately admitted committing pedophile acts.