San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Pope defrocks former cardinal in U.S. accused of sexual abuse
VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis has defrocked former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick after Vatican officials found the American guilty of soliciting for sex while hearing confession and of sexual crimes against minors and adults, the Holy See said Saturday.
McCarrick, 88, is the highestranking Catholic churchman to be laicized, as the process is called. It means he can no longer celebrate Mass or other sacraments, wear clerical vestments or be addressed by any religious title. He is the first churchman who reached the rank of cardinal to be defrocked in the church’s sex abuse scandals.
The punishment for the oncepowerful prelate, who had served as the archbishop of Washington and spent years in New Jersey dioceses, was announced five days before Francis leads an extraordinary gathering of bishops from around the world to help the church grapple with the crisis of sex abuse by clergy and the coverups by church hierarchy.
The Vatican’s press office said the Holy See’s Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith found McCarrick on Jan. 11 guilty of “solicitation in the sacrament of confession, and sins against the Sixth Commandment with minors and adults, with the aggravating factor of the abuse of power.” The commandment forbids adultery.
McCarrick’s lawyer, Barry Coburn, said his client had no comment on the defrocking. Coburn declined to say if McCarrick would stay at the residence in Kansas where he moved after Francis ordered him to live in penance. Frances D’Emilio and Nicole Winfield are Associated Press writers.