Commentary

Dear Bishop Sartain:

We trust you had a wonderful holiday and look forward to the new year.

We would like to follow up with you on several items since our meeting last April, 2007. You may recall that we inquired as to when you would provide the Bishop’s annual update letter in regard to the sexual abuse of children and teens in the parishes of the Joliet Diocese. You indicated that it would be published shortly. We have also inquired to your staff and understood that it would be forthcoming, but to date we have not seen such a letter from you on the diocesan website, in the parish bulletins, or in the Joliet Catholic Explorer newspaper.

As you can see from the Diocese website Bishop Imesh used to publish a letter in March of each year (the last one in 2006). We did note that the Diocese distributed a Dec. 14 press release on the annual Abuse Audit Report but have not seen your letter. We would like to emphasize again that lack of communication and transparency on this issue can confuse the faithful as to the level of sexual abuse allegations in the Joliet Diocese, and may perhaps lead parishioners to assume that there is much more inappropriate sexual activity under review by the Review Committee than may be the case.

We also noticed that the website now shows the members of this Review Committee. We are very pleased with the addition of this information to the diocesan website. We were concerned when the entire Committee list of members was removed previously from the diocesan website after the former Chair of the Review Committee was, himself, accused of abuse in 2006. It is heartening to note that a former judge (the Honorable William Penn) is now heading the Committee.

We have suggested several times before that, in the interest of full transparency and rebuilding trust, a chart showing the activity/disposition statistics of the Committee (not specific case information) be published on a quarterly basis. Perhaps you could discuss this with Judge Penn who would be familiar with such standard case statistics from the judicial system.

A final note is that we would appreciate your considering more public responses, such as press releases in the media and on the Diocese website, for all allegations of sexual abuse in the Joliet Diocese. Two recent situations that come to mind are the case of the church organist (Richard Stocker) who worked in several (9) Catholic parishes and high schools in the Joliet Diocese over the past 30 years. In 2007 he pled guilty to having hundreds of images of child pornography on his home computer. Two civil suits have also been filed against him by men who say that they were molested by him when they were high school students. However, there is no information about this case posted on the Joliet Diocesan website.

Also, there was the case of the priest, Fr. James Radek, who is accused of embezzling funds from the Joliet parish where he served as pastor. He pled guilty to this offense, but again, there is no information whatsoever about this person posted on the Joliet Diocesan website.     

Without public notification and comment on remedial actions by the Diocese, the parish faithful affected by the perpetrator may be unaware of the inappropriate sexual or fiscal activities that took place in their parishes. If parishioners (not just pastors) were notified of these activities in a timely fashion, additional victims and / or witnesses might come forward to corroborate (if correct) the allegations and start the healing process. In the case of fiscal mismanagement, better/stronger protocols might be instituted by the Parish Finance Councils to prevent future financial mismanagement/embezzlement.

Bishop Sartain, we, the membership of Voice of the Faithful in the Joliet Diocese, strongly believe that the parishioners are entitled to “full disclosure” of illegal and/or harmful activities that are perpetrated by any member of the parish staff, be they clergy or lay persons, so as to prevent such activities in the future. We hope and assume that you see the wisdom and the moral imperative of a “full disclosure” standard in regard to both sexual abuse of minors, and fiscal mismanagement of parish/diocesan funds. 

We would appreciate your response, commitment and/or dialogue on these suggestions.

Sincerely,

Paul LeFort, Chair

Voice of the Faithful / Joliet Diocese

CC:  Judge William Penn