SAN DIEGO -- The Catholic Diocese of San Diego is asking parishioners and priests to make contributions to help pay for the recent $198.1 million sexual abuse settlement.I don't think this is going to be received very well by the rank-and-file parish members. The reason these settlements are so outrageously high is the diocese had a habit of transferring their problems around rather than dealing with them. Consequently, the victim tally just kept climbing.
A memo issued this week by Bishop Robert Brom asked priests to contribute one month's salary, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.
"We cannot ask of others what we are unwilling to do ourselves," Brom wrote in the memo to about 280 priests, whose monthly salary can be as much as $1,535.
The donation requests will help "cover the expense involved in compassionate outreach to our brothers and sisters who suffered sexual abuse within the family of the church," the memo said.
The idea came from current priests who saw it as a gesture toward the 144 people who allege they were abused by clergy members and church workers when they were minors.
"It's a way of kind of righting some of the injustices done to them and also start the healing process," said the Rev. Ned Brockhaus of St. John of the Cross in Lemon Grove.
Judy Bethel, a Catholic and San Diego resident, said that if Brom hadn't sought Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection for the diocese in February, he could have settled the suits for less money.
"I think he's asking us to bear the cost of his mistakes," Bethel said. "I, for one, am not willing to do this."
One San Diego catholic suggested that the bishops should go to other diocese and get the funds from them. It wasn't the parish members that caused the problem in the first place, or allowed it to fester and grow. This latest request will undoubtedly drive many people out of the church altogether.
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