Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on an Associated Press story on the Catholic Church:
Everyone from Nancy Pelosi’s husband to the Los Angeles Lakers has received money from the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), but none of the individuals and organizations who have benefited from the congressional legislation angers the Associated Press (AP), except for the Catholic Church. It is livid that a dime went to pay for the Church.
AP did not do an investigation of Jewish, Mormon, Muslim, or Protestant houses of worship, or institutions affiliated with them. But it did probe the Catholic Church. Did the Church do anything illegal? No. Then what’s the beef? It got too much money. It also doesn’t like the fact that some of the money could be spent on lawsuits.
For instance, AP cites the “dramatic rise in recent clergy sex abuse claims,” mentioning former cardinal Theodore McCarrick and the 2018 Pennsylvania grand jury report.
These journalists are embarrassing to their profession.
The sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church took place between 1965 and 1985. The latest audit of clergy sexual abuse, released a few weeks ago, shows that there were 8 substantiated accusations made against a member of the clergy between July 1, 2018 and June 30, 2019. Given that there are 49,972 clergy members, that means that .016 percent had a substantiated allegation made against them.
McCarrick is a disgrace but one man has nothing to do with the kind of hyperbole that the AP indulges in. The grand jury report was about priests who are mostly either dead or out of ministry.
What is perhaps most striking about the AP story is its disinterest in Hollywood law firms that received PPP money. Dozens of them did so. Maybe AP can find out how much money went to pay off the kids whom the celebrities raped.
The funds received by Catholic dioceses go to pay for an array of services, many of which are vital to the poor. To suggest otherwise is not only unfair, it is malicious.
Contact Brian Carovillano, managing editor, AP: bcarovillano@ap.org
