The Rev. Paul Shanley, right, shakes hands with then Archbishop Bernard Law in an undated photo
"It's incomprehensible," says the Rev. Robert Bullock, who has been ministering in Boston for nearly half a century and who has known Shanley just as long. "The revelations have been so staggering and so shocking that there is no way to integrate this material into some kind of orderly narrative of events."
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Shanley, now 71, didn't just have sex with children; he publicly endorsed the concept. He didn't just use his collar to get access to minors; he ran a special ministry for the most vulnerable among them. And he didn't fly below the radar of the church hierarchy; the 818-page archive released by the Boston Archdiocese under court order shows that two Cardinals and a phalanx of deputies knew about allegations of his abuse going back more than 30 years. But instead of handing Shanley over to police or at least defrocking him, they ignored, protected or promoted him. More than 40 alleged victims have now claimed abuse.
If any scandal can bring down the most powerful Cardinal in the country, it could be this one. The steady drumbeat for the resignation of Bernard Cardinal Law grew louder last week, with the Boston Globe and some of Law's staunchest former defenders saying he must go. Several major donors to the diocese's Catholic Charities are withholding funds. Law issued a statement on Friday saying he intends to stay--but this drama is not over.
To begin to understand how this implosion came to pass, it is necessary to learn another language. Church officials have responded to Shanley in the dialect of the Roman Catholic bureaucracy--which is fluent in the language of forgiveness and secrecy. "I am sure that all the legal activity will add to your stress," wrote one of Law's top officials to Shanley. "I will do all I can to make sure that you are cared for and supported." But it is also necessary to understand the unique allure of Shanley.
Paul Shanley was a media darling, a nationally known "hippie priest" who busted out of the Catholic stereotype at a time when the country was craving just such a novelty. "There was something highly seductive about him," says Bullock, who attended seminary with Shanley. In the 1970s Shanley grew thick sideburns and wore overalls. He gave irreverent lectures about the foolishness of the drug war and the normalcy of bisexuality. And most of all, he made it his lifetime pursuit to help wayward children, running a special ministry for teenagers who had run away or were confused about their sexuality. In a 1970 letter to the Archdiocese, one thankful parishioner wrote: "They flock around him as if he is the Pied Piper...[It's] a feeling of, 'When I am with Father Paul, I am somebody.'" And according to alleged victims, once Shanley had their trust, he molested them.
It can't be the case that the Church was just looking to avoid scandal by putting up with Shanley, because he already was a scandal. In 1978 he was present at the founding meeting of the North American Man-Boy Love Association. He was quoted in GaysWeek, a short-lived New York publication, as questioning the morality of pedophilia laws, praising the "deep love" possible in a man-boy relationship and bemoaning the pain that moral condemnation of such liaisons can cause youngsters. "We have our convictions upside down, if we are truly concerned with boys," he said. "The 'cure' does far more damage." This was not Shanley's only endorsement of pedophilia. Two other times, in 1977 and 1985, laypersons reported similar comments to the Archdiocese. Even the Vatican inquired about Shanley--writing in 1978 to Boston's then Cardinal, Humberto Medeiros, to complain about Shanley's endorsement of homosexuality. In response, the Cardinal ordered Shanley not to minister to gays anymore. Shanley's unfettered access to children continued, however.
The first document accusing Shanley of molestation is dated 1967. A priest at another church near Shanley's wrote that a boy had told him he had been abused by Shanley at a cabin in the woods. In 1983, according to two lawsuits recently filed against Law, Shanley began repeatedly molesting two 6-year-old boys in his parish, St. John the Evangelist, in Newton, Mass. Gregory Ford and Paul Busa both say Shanley would regularly pull them out of catechism class and make them play the card game War. Whoever lost had to perform a sexual act, says Busa, now 24. The abuse lasted for about six years, he says. No criminal charges have been filed yet against Shanley.
In 1990 Shanley moved to California. Even though his personnel file had multiple allegations of child abuse, then Rev. Robert Banks, a top deputy to Law, sent the San Bernadino diocese a letter vouching for him. "I can assure you that Father Shanley has no problem that would be a concern to your diocese," he wrote. There were no restrictions placed on his access to minors. Shanley wrote that he handled all baptisms and youth retreats at St. Anne's in San Bernadino. On the side, he and another priest also owned a hotel for gay guests in Palm Springs, Calif. Last week San Bernadino officials said that there had been no problems with Shanley, but that they would never have allowed him to come had they known of his past.