New York City priest says he repeatedly warned senior church officials about Cardinal McCarrick’s ‘sexual abuse after he was informed by individuals directly involved’
- A priest said he warned church officials about Cardinal Theodore McCarrick’s alleged sex abuse
- Father Boniface Ramsey wrote a letter to Cardinal Sean O’Malley in June 2015
- The letter was sent to O’Malley after Pope Francis appointed him to lead a child sex abuse protection commission
- O’Malley said in response that he didn’t see a letter sent to his office in 2015
- He apologized to the pastor and anyone whose concerns were reflected in it
- Pope Francis ordered McCarrick removed from public ministry amid allegations he abused an altar boy and engaged in sexual misconduct with seminarians
A priest in New York City said he repeatedly warned church officials about now ex-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick – who was suspended last month over sex abuse allegations.
Father Boniface Ramsey told CBS News this week: ‘I had the impression that virtually everyone knew about it.
‘Archbishop McCarrick was inviting seminarians to his beach house. There were five beds… and there were six people. Archbishop McCarrick arranged it in such a way that somebody would join him in his bed.’
The priest, an archbishop of Newark at the time, said he was informed about the inappropriate behavior in 1986.
Father Boniface Ramsey (seen above in a CBS interview) said ‘virtually everyone knew’ about Cardinal Theodore McCarrick’s alleged sex abuse
Ramsey said he wrote a letter to senior church officials in 2015 that was ignored
Archbishop Sean Cardinal O’Malley (seen above at the Boston College 2017 141st Commencement Exercises at Boston College Alumni Stadium on May 22, 2017 in Boston, Massachusetts) apologized Monday and said he didn’t see a letter sent to his office in 2015
Ramsey wrote in a letter to Cardinal Sean O’Malley, of Boston, in June 2015: ‘Some of these stories were not presented to me as mere rumors but were told to me by persons directly involved.’
The letter was sent to O’Malley after Pope Francis appointed him as president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors.
O’Malley said Monday that he didn’t see a letter sent to his office in 2015 concerning McCarrick’s possible inappropriate behavior with seminarians.
‘I should have seen that letter precisely because it made assertions about the behavior of an archbishop in the church,’ he said.
Cardinal Theodore McCarrick is seen on December 8, 2015 in Washington, D.C. McCarrick has said he has ‘absolutely no recollection of this reported abuse’ and believes in his innocence
O’Malley said his priest secretary told the pastor a recommendation to review cases fell outside the commission’s mandate.
He apologized Monday to the pastor and to anyone whose concerns were reflected in the letter.
Pope Francis ordered McCarrick removed from public ministry amid allegations he sexually abused a teenage altar boy and engaged in sexual misconduct with adult seminarians decades ago.
McCarrick has said he has ‘absolutely no recollection of this reported abuse’ and believes in his innocence.
Pope Francis leaves his studio window overlooking St. Peter’s Square at the end of the Angelus noon prayer at the Vatican on August 19, 2018. The pope ordered McCarrick removed from public ministry amid allegations
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