The Archbishop of Washington told priests Tuesday that he intends to meet with Pope Francis soon to discuss his resignation from office.
In a letter sent to priests of the Archdiocese of Washington Sept. 11, Cardinal Donald Wuerl wrote that a decision about his future role in the archdiocese is “an essential aspect so that this archdiocesan Church we all love can move forward.
“I intend, in the very near future, to go to Rome to meet with our Holy Father about the resignation I presented nearly three years ago, November 12, 2015.”
Wuerl presented his resignation to the pope in 2015 upon turning 75, the age at which diocesan bishops are requested to submit letters of resignation to the pope.
Calls for Pope Francis to accept Wuerl’s resignation have been frequent in recent months. In June, Wuerl’s predecessor in Washington, Archbishop Theodore McCarrick, was publicly accused of serially sexually abusing a teenage boy in the 1970s. As further accusations were made that McCarrick sexually coerced and assaulted seminarians for decades, questions were raised about whether Wuerl knew about McCarrick’s apparent sexual misconduct.
After the Aug. 14 release of a report from a grand jury in Pennsylvania, calls for Wuerl to be replaced intensified. That report suggested that Wuerl had been negligent in the supervision of priests accused of sexually abusing minors while he was Bishop of Pittsburgh, in one case permitting a priest accused of sexual abuse to transfer from ministry in one diocese to another, and signing off on the priest’s suitability for ministry.
An Aug. 25 letter from a former Vatican ambassador to the U.S., Archbishop Carlo Vigano, raised further questions about Wuerl’s knowledge of McCarrick’s misconduct, and a report that Wuerl permitted McCarrick to have seminarian assistants while under investigation for sexual abuse led to additional criticism.
The Archdiocese of Washington would not confirm when Wuerl will meet with Pope Francis.
Full story at Catholic News Agency.
Is anyone staffing the desk at the Vatican ‘Personnel Office”? I would expect they could identify three well qualified Archbishops for the Pope’s consideration three years ago, when the Cardinal turned seventy five. The Pope should either honor the ‘retire at 75’ rule or formally modify it.
No doubt Wuerl has to go, and I see it this way. Wuerl takes a one-way trip to Rome and gets lifetime protection like Law. Wuerl keeps the red hat and thus gets two plus years in which he can vote for a liberal pope, should the occasion arise. DC gets a younger, liberal bishop. How does this change anything?
I think it’s time for Wuerl to go. He’s done nothing tangible to bring to light, punish and turn over to authorities those who have abused or hidden homosexual activity by priests of God who are supposed to protect, live by the tenets of the Teachings of Christ and they haven’t and Wuerl is complicit. He is not a good shepherd.
Wuerl, by all accounts, is going to Rome for sanctuary. He certainly does not want to face the music in the USA regarding his complicity with homo-clerics. He is a vile man, mendacious and duplicitous, just like many, many in the Vatican, so he should be at home there.
Congratulations to at least a good number of Wuerl’s priests that refused any attempts at normalcy by him. Pray for Donald Wuerl, to be sure, but keep him out of the Church, at least as an active prelate (at any level). Yet Wuerl is but one top level on the rotten fruit that is Catholic leadership.
I am so sick of people being tried, convicted and sentenced on the Internet.
Really, “Anonymous?” After the decades of homosexual rampage throughout the Church, victimizing innocent boys (mostly), you are concerned with bad publicity? You must be the “Anonymous” that is sponsored, or written by, George Soros. The “Internet” has been invaluable in that it does much to equalize the knowledge base between the evil doers and the laity. Much tougher for the Vatican and Minions to cover-up when what they do becomes very, very public. Just look at what publication of the VIgano letter has done. Such results are beneficial and are not gossip or hearsay (mostly). Also, the Internet gives people a chance to voice their views on an appropriate remedy.
I am not concerned about bad publicity. I do not know who George Soros is.
What did publication of the Vigano letter do? It got the gay mafia concern in the media,
It was the time for all these people who kvetch about the gay mafia to bring forward their information.
One person came forward. One.
You can voice your opinions. Other people can have opinions about what you write.
SC .. The best data we have is that 1% o the priests have committed these abuses. Even if they were all gay, and they wern’t I don’t see how that constitutes a “homosexual rampage. What do we know … think we know .. about the gay mafia. Do they hold meetings? elect officers? is there a roster out there?
Ftom all the accusations I’ve heard they sound about as sinister and organized as my quaint little “Lesbian & Bisexual Women’s Conversation and Potluck Group.” I swear, some of the people her spend a lot more time thinking about homosexuals and homosexuality than I do.
And if we did not have the internet, do you suppose that any of this would have seen the light of day?
I have a “love/hate” affair with the internet, but when it gives the ability to expose this disgusting rot, then I am all for it.
The internet is just a medium by which people can do good or evil.
Harming someone’s reputation is a sin.
There are reasons where it must be done.
Internet use can harm your soul.
Holy people probably don’t use it much except to evangelize or contribute to good works.
I am not holy but I can see where it has harmed me.
I recommend to you a book by Cardinal Sarah. it is called “The Power of Silence: Against the Dictatorship of Noise”
The Boston Globe didn’t need the internet to publish its first exposes. Published reports went back to the 1980s and 1990s, before there was such a thing as the world wide web.
And as to the accusations that this is all about homosexuality, why is it then, that the gay press has been among the first to condemn the abuses? If all gay people were the horrors you think we are, why would we rush to condemn ourselves?
YFC get it through your homosexual head its is about gays in the priesthood… Tomas DeTorquemada pray for us
If Wuerl goes to Rome for sanctuary, like Law, the Church suffers a major blow to its remaining credibility. Whatever else he may have done, Mahoney stayed in California.
Sow the wind and reap the Wuerlwind. This ends badly for him and for the church in America.
HF is also over 75. Just saying.
To Anonymous…..Everyone is sick at heart at what is happening in our Catholic Church. Pray the rosary rather than complaining…..it will do far more good.