The new bishop of Springfield, Mass., is starting out very quickly to clean up the mess left behind by his predecessor. Bishop Timothy McDonnell has suspended a priest whose case had been taking too long to investigate, already accepted the resignation of an accused lay employee, has entered serious negotiations on a settlement with victims suing the diocese, and is disassociating the diocese from a fund set up to give money to laicized priests. The diocese has also hired a former State Police detective to carry out investigations.
It’s still too early to tell for sure, and there may be a joker still in the deck, but it looks like most of the episcopal appointments made by the Holy Father since the beginning of last year have been good ones with bishops committed to cleaning up the messes left behind by the predecessors. Of course, it’s a long process and we won’t really be sure of the fix for some time.
Still, it’s also interesting that Bishop McDonnell has been able to do in a few weeks time what Bishop Dupre was unable to do in his years there. It looks there may be something to the thesis that bishops who are personally compromised are ineffective in dealing with the Scandal.
