Former Catholic head of Milwaukee admits he's gay 

Yahoo News 

Tue May 12, 12:11 am ET  

By RACHEL ZOLL, AP Religion Writer Rachel 

 NEW YORK – A Roman Catholic archbishop who resigned in 2002 over a sex and financial scandal involving a man describes his struggles with being gay in an upcoming memoir about his decades serving the church. 

Archbishop Rembert Weakland, former head of the Milwaukee archdiocese, said in an interview Monday that he wrote about his sexual orientation because he wanted to be candid about "how this came to life in my own self, how I suppressed it, how it resurrected again." 

Called "A Pilgrim in a Pilgrim Church: Memoirs of a Catholic Archbishop," the book is set to be released in June. 

"I was very careful and concerned that the book not become a Jerry Springer, to satisfy people's prurient curiosity or anything of this sort," Weakland told The Associated Press. "At the same time, I tried to be as honest as I can." 

Weakland stepped down soon after Paul Marcoux, a former Marquette University theology student, revealed in May 2002 that he was paid $450,000 to settle a sexual assault claim he made against the archbishop more than two decades earlier. The money came from the archdiocese. 

Marcoux went public at the height of anger over the clergy sex abuse crisis, when Catholics and others were demanding that dioceses reveal the extent of molestation by clergy and how much had been confidentially spent to settle claims. 

Weakland denied ever assaulting anyone. He apologized for concealing the payment.

The Vatican says that men with "deep-seated" attraction to other men should not be ordained.In an August 1980 letter that was obtained by the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, Weakland said he was in emotional turmoil over Marcoux and that he had "come back to the importance of celibacy in my life." He signed the letter, "I love you." 

The revelations rocked the Milwaukee archdiocese, which Weakland had led since 1977. He was a hero for liberal Catholics nationwide because of his work on social justice and other issues. The archbishop, now 82, said he seriously considered the potential pain for the archdiocese of renewing attention to the scandal and thought about waiting "until I was dead" to have it published. But he decided to move ahead with the project.

 "What I felt was that people who loved me as bishop here, when they read the book will continue to love me. The people who found it difficult, I hope will be helped a little bit by the book," he said. 

In a sign of the deep emotions still surrounding Weakland and his departure, the Archdiocese of Milwaukee has released a public statement alerting local Catholics to the upcoming book. 

"Some people will be angry about the book, others will support it," the archdiocese said.Weakland also writes about his failures to stop sexually abusive priests. In a videotaped deposition released last November, Weakland admitted returning guilty priests to active ministry without alerting parishioners or police. 

"Any deposition is just a part of a whole picture and that picture has not been painted yet. And anybody can take out of that any sentence they want," Weakland said in the interview. "I try to deal with this, I hope in an honest way, admitting my weaknesses in not being able to see this earlier, but at the same time doing what I could confront it." 

Advocates for abuse victims said that Weakland's cover-up of his own sexual activity was part of a pattern of secrecy that included concealing the criminal behavior of child molesters. 

Weakland, a Benedictine monk, served in Rome as leader of the International Benedictine Confederation and also worked on a liturgy commission for the Second Vatican Council, which made reforms in the 1960s meant to modernize the church.  

Weakland said he wrote in the memoir that he was unprepared for "how lonely it is" to be a bishop and how difficult it can be to get the "feedback and support you need."  

U.S. Catholics have long debated whether the priesthood had become a predominantly gay vocation. Estimates vary from 25 percent to 50 percent, according to a review of research on the issue by the Rev. Donald Cozzens, author of "The Changing Face of the Priesthood."  

Weakland said Christians needed to speak more openly about gays in the priesthood without the "hysteria" that often characterizes the debate.  

The archbishop has been living in a retirement community near the Milwaukee archdiocese and plans to move to St. Mary's Abbey in Morristown, N.J., this summer. He said he was not bitter about how the scandal had eclipsed his decades of work in the church.  

"I refused to let myself become a victim and refused to let myself become angry," he said. "I want to take responsibility but I want to move on." 

EXCLUSIVE: People React to Weakland Book 

TMJ 40 Milwaukee 16 May 2009  

Mick Trevey 

MILWAUKEE - People are speaking out about former Milwaukee Archbishop Rembert Weakland's new book. TODAY'S TMJ4 reporter Mick Trevey obtained an exclusive publisher's preview copy of the manuscript.

In the book, Weakland writes about growing up in Pennsylvania and serving in Milwaukee for 25 years as archbishop.

He also talks frankly about the priest sex scandal and his own sexuality.

"It's a very painful thing," said priest sexual abuse victim John Pilmaier about the book.

Weakland admits that priests were moved from parish to parish because of sex abuse cases. "Such a move would give the priest a chance to start over, and before 1985 this was common practice," Weakland writes.

He also writes that priests were given more attention than their victims were. "In handling these cases, I had accepted naively the common view that it was not necessary to worry about the effects on the youngsters: either they would not remember it or would 'grow out of it'," Weakland wrote.

Abuse victim Pilmaier says that shows the Archdiocese disregarded the victims' futures saying, "I've told people it's a life sentence. It's not something you can just get over or grow out of."

Weakland also writes that he did not see the sexual abuse as illegal. "We all considered sexual abuse of minors as a moral evil, but had no understanding of its criminal nature," Weakland says in the book.

"It's like it hasn't happened yet for him. It hasn't occurred. It hasn't reached him," said Peter Isely of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.

The book also has the attention of trial lawyers who believe the text could be used against the Archdiocese in lawsuits filed by abuse victims.

Attorney Ted Warshafsky says, "They're admissions that somebody who was in charge aided and abetted and continued a practice that was illegal."

Attorney Robert Habush said, "That's an admission of fraud."

As to Weakland's belief that abuse victims would "grow out of it," attorney Will Techmeier said he would make sure that was brought up in a trial. "I would want the jury to know about that," he said.

Lawyers for the Archdiocese would not comment on the legal ramifications of Weakland's book because of pending litigation.

TODAY'S TMJ4 reporter Mick Trevey spoke with former Archbishop Weakland Friday afternoon. He declined to do an interview saying he wanted to let some of the attention "die down" first.

Weakland in The Rite of Sodomy 

The following are excerpts from The Rite of Sodomy (Randy Engel, 2006) regarding Rembert Weakland, the former Archbishop of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.   They show in part the damage wrought during Weakland's tenure as archbishop ( 1977-2002) 

His most important contributions to AmChurch during his tenure as Archbishop of Milwaukee were in the area of liturgical "reform" as a member of the NCCB Committee on the Liturgy, and ecumenical affairs as Chairman of the NCCB Committee for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs.

……

Archbishop Weakland was one of the first supporters of the forays of the Homosexual Collective into the Catholic Church in America. In [Father Enrique] Rueda's The Homosexual Network, published in 1982, Weakland's role in assisting the Collective to advance its agenda in AmChurch is well documented.

As reported by Rueda, Weakland's pro-homosexual position including active support for pro-homosexual legislation is a matter of public record and his contribution to the Homosexual Movement has been acknowledged by all major national homosexual groups including the National Gay Task Force, Dignity and New Ways Ministry.

……

Archbishop Weakland helped to found and fund the Milwaukee AIDS Project, a 1986 initiative that included condom distribution for "safe" homosex and "alternatives" to sodomy including mutual masturbation, consensual sadomasochist sex play and the use of "sex toys."

Weakland permitted Dignity Masses at St. Pius X Catholic Church, with the rainbow flag draped on the floor for an altar, for more than ten years.

……

In April, 2002, when the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel began an extended series on clerical sex abuse in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, District Attorney E. Michael McCann said his office was flooded with calls from victims, many of whom were molested by priests who were still being recycled from parish to parish.

According to writer-researcher Robert A. Sungenis, "Out of 36 priests who were named as child molesters in the archdiocese, 21 of them are still in the Milwaukee area and 6 of those have active assignments. Not one of the 36 has ever been so much as questioned, and no parishioners, except the victims, knew the names of these priests."

While the archdiocesan public relations department touted Weakland's model program for handling clerical sex offenders, the archbishop was shuffling offenders from parish to parish.

A well-documented case in point was that of Father William Effinger, whose victims number over 150, mainly boys, but also some young girls. In 1993, a judge ordered the opening of hereto-sealed court records of the case and Weakland was deposed in connection with a lawsuit brought by nine of Effinger's victims.

In April 1979, Effinger told Archbishop Weakland that he abused a 13-year-old altar boy named Joseph Cernigilia during the past Easter Week. The priest had asked Joseph to stay overnight at the parish rectory because of early Mass the next day. That evening, Effinger gave the boy a beer, got him into the only available bed and molested him. Cernigilia told his parents about the molestation. The following morning, after the Easter Sunday Mass, they confronted the criminal priest and shortly thereafter informed Weakland of the abuse. Weakland said the matter should be kept quiet for the child's sake and promised that the priest would never be put in a position where he could harm another boy. At about the same time, Weakland was privy to a second allegation concerning Father Effinger.

Weakland sent the wayward priest away for evaluation and treatment.

That same fall, Weakland reassigned Effinger to Holy Name Parish in Sheboygan where the priest had daily access to parochial school children.

For the next 13 years, Weakland moved Effinger around the archdiocese from parish to parish until 1992 when one of the priest's teenage victims, now grown, confronted the priest, recorded their conversation and took the taped confession to the archdiocese and a television station. Only Weakland's fear of adverse publicity prompted him to act.

Effinger was convicted in 1993 of the sexual assault of a 14-year-old-boy. Effinger died in prison in 1996 of cancer.

The real kicker in the Effinger case was that after the priest went to jail, one of the boys he molested sued the archdiocese, but the suit was thrown out because the statute of limitations had expired. Weakland turned around and directed the diocesan lawyers to file a countersuit against the boy's family. The archbishop recovered $4,000 in court costs from the victim. ..

Then there is the twice-arrested, twice-convicted boy molester Father Dennis Pecore. "The Pecore Affair" is reported by Margaret Joughin in a two-part online series, "The Weakland File."

In January 1987, Pecore was charged with the sexual abuse of 14-year-old Gregory Bernau, who attended Mother of Good Council School. Pecore performed acts of oral copulation and sodomy on the boy. The molestation began in January 1984 and continued through December 1985. In 1986, Bernau reported Father Pecore to the police for sexual abuse. On July 24, 1987, Pecore pleaded guilty to pedophilia and received a one-year jail sentence. Seven years later, he molested another boy and was given a 12-year sentence.

The saga of Father Pecore began in 1983 when Weakland moved a new three-member "pastoral team" into Good Council Parish in Milwaukee. The "team" consisted of Father Fred Rosing, pastor, and Fathers Dennis Pecore and Peter Schuesler. Parishioners and teachers were put off by the arbitrary actions and financial mismanagement of "the team," but what drew the greatest concern was the fact that Pecore was bringing young boys into his bedroom one at a time. Father Bruce Brentrup, the school principle was aware of the moral turpitude that marked the behavior of the new pastor and his assistants. In 1984, one year after the arrival of Rosing & Company, poor Father Brentrup was history.

Young Greg Bernau became one of Pecore's sex toys.

On at least two occasions, Pastor Rosing entered Pecore's bedroom while the priest was abusing Bernau. Rosing said hello to the boy and left the bedroom — no questions were asked because no answers were needed.

On one occasion, when Greg's mother, distressed by Pecore's unnatural attentions toward her son, called the rectory and was told that her son was not there. Mrs. Bernau got into her car, drove by the rectory and spotted her son's bike parked outside. It wasn't until she knocked on the rectory door that a priest came to the door and acknowledged that Greg was indeed there.

While the molestation of Greg Bernau was underway, Archbishop Weakland had been informed in writing by three teachers from the parish school regarding their concerns about Pecore's pederastic interests, especially in Gregory Bernau. Weakland responded by threatening the whistleblowers. He told them that "any libelous material found in your letter will be scrutinized carefully by our lawyers." Eventually, Weakland saw to it that all of the teachers involved in the confrontation lost their jobs. Their letters of termination were signed by Father Rosing who had also engineered Father Brentrup's dismissal.

After the first arrest and conviction of Father Pecore, Greg Bernau and his family reached an out-of- court settlement with Weakland and the Archdiocese of Milwaukee for $595,000 and an additional $200,000 in court fees. Against the wishes of the Bernau family, but at the insistence of the Archdiocese, the court records were sealed. However, on May 2, 1988 at the request of Mr. Bernau, Judge Robert J. Miech ordered the records unsealed and opened to the public. Weakland's complicity in this moral outrage was exposed for all to see. No action was taken against Father Pecore's partner in crime, Father Rosing.

Another interesting case is that of Father James L. Arimond, columnist for the notorious homosexual magazine The Wisconsin Light. Arimond considers homosexuality "God's holy gift." Archbishop Weakland permitted Arimond to give pro-homosexual pep rallies at the archdiocesan Cousins Centre. The archbishop repeatedly ignored protests regarding Arimond's pro-homosexual activities and even gave the priest a promotion. Father Arimond was defrocked after he was convicted and jailed in 1990 for a sexual assault on a teenage boy. Arimond later became a licensed professional counselor in the state of Wisconsin.

One subscriber to The Wisconsin Light wrote that the Archbishop Weakland's own parish, St. John's Cathedral, is "second only to the homosexual bar district and the shopping mall as a homosexual gathering place."

It seems the list of clerical pederasts and homosexual priests acting out in the Milwaukee Archdiocese, whom Weakland protected, could go on forever.

There was former seminary rector Father Jerome Clifford of the Sacred Heart School of Theology in Milwaukee, who resigned amidst multiple charges of sexual misconduct.

There was Father David Hanser, who molested the sons of Catholic parishioners for three decades, including three brothers in one family.

There was Father Peter Burns, another priest with a long record of young male victims. Even though the priest's superiors knew of his affinity for young boys, he was permitted to have young men sleep overnight at St. Peter Claver's rectory. Burns was also an active member of the Big Brothers and Big Sisters program. Tragically, one of his victims, whose parents decided not to press charges against Father Burns, committed suicide in 1992. Up until the day of his arrest and eventual imprisonment, officials of the Archdiocese of Milwaukee permitted Father Burns to freely roam the archdiocese without anyone being informed of his criminal activities.

There was Father Thomas Walker, who was arrested just one month after Weakland ordained him in 1989 for allegedly having sex with a truck driver, and arrested again in 1999 for prostitution and masturbation.

And there was layman Robert E. Thibault, Weakland's top liaison to the Boy Scouts and a teacher of religion at a Catholic school, who was arrested in an Internet child sex sting.