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Curran is willing to bend somewhat; he has offered not to teach sexual-ethics classes if the Vatican will settle for issuing a statement detailing his errors, but allow him to continue as a theology teacher. Mindful of the potential donnybrook if Curran is dismissed, Joseph Cardinal Bernardin of Chicago, head of Catholic University's board of trustees, has lobbied with the Pope and Ratzinger to accept such a compromise, so far to no avail.
The theology chairman at the University of Notre Dame, Father Richard McBrien, considers the Curran case "the biggest blunder the Vatican has committed with the American church" in two decades. But to a more conservative theologian in Rome "the question is, Why did the Vatican wait so long?" --By Richard N. Ostling. Reported by Erik Amfitheatrof/Rome and Jim Castelli/Washington