Tom McNichol: Papalgate: The Pope's Nixon Problem
The ever-widening scandal over Pope Benedict XVI’s handling of Church sex abuse cases has an eerily familiar ring: it's unfolding in much the same way that Watergate played out for Richard Nixon. Each day brings new revelations, to which the Pope and his supporters respond with carefully crafted explanations and pointed counterattacks.
Is this Watergate with holy water? Here’s a look at some of the ways in which Pope Benedict XVI has found himself caught up in a scandal of Nixonian proportions.
During the Watergate hearings, Senator Howard Baker famously posed the question that came to define the case against Richard Nixon: "What did the President know and when did he know it?" There’s ample evidence that Nixon had no prior knowledge of the Watergate break-in. So the crucial question became, What did Nixon do once he found out about White House involvement in the crime?
Pope Benedict XVI currently faces the same question: What did he know about the sexual abuse and when did he know it? The answer in each of the cases is, at least for now, ambiguous. The Pope received internal correspondence from bishops in Wisconsin about Rev. Lawrence C. Murphy, a priest who molested as many as 200 deaf boys. The bishops warned that failing to act on the matter could embarrass the church and leave it open to legal action. But the pedophile priest was never defrocked. The Vatican insists that the Pope had “no knowledge” of the correspondence—the same words Richard Nixon regularly used to describe his innocence in the Watergate affair....
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Is this Watergate with holy water? Here’s a look at some of the ways in which Pope Benedict XVI has found himself caught up in a scandal of Nixonian proportions.
During the Watergate hearings, Senator Howard Baker famously posed the question that came to define the case against Richard Nixon: "What did the President know and when did he know it?" There’s ample evidence that Nixon had no prior knowledge of the Watergate break-in. So the crucial question became, What did Nixon do once he found out about White House involvement in the crime?
Pope Benedict XVI currently faces the same question: What did he know about the sexual abuse and when did he know it? The answer in each of the cases is, at least for now, ambiguous. The Pope received internal correspondence from bishops in Wisconsin about Rev. Lawrence C. Murphy, a priest who molested as many as 200 deaf boys. The bishops warned that failing to act on the matter could embarrass the church and leave it open to legal action. But the pedophile priest was never defrocked. The Vatican insists that the Pope had “no knowledge” of the correspondence—the same words Richard Nixon regularly used to describe his innocence in the Watergate affair....