BOSTON - He has the ear of the pope and the president. His trips to Cuba and Israel to strengthen the church enhanced an international reputation. His stewardship of his Boston archdiocese helped him evolve from outsider to respected leader.
Despite these achievements, Cardinal Bernard Law’s legacy may boil down to one name: John Geoghan.
Law’s decision to assign the defrocked priest Geoghan to a new parish, even though Geoghan had already been removed from two parishes for molesting children, threatens to bury years of work under charges of negligence and deceit.
When it comes future assessments of Law, forget everything that came before, said Ray Flynn, former Boston mayor and U.S. ambassador to the Vatican.
“It’s what he does from here,” he said.
Geoghan is accused of molesting 130 children, and was convicted Jan. 18 in the first of three child sex abuse cases. Last week, documents released in the case show Law praising Geoghan and making little mention of the alleged victims.
Law now faces media calls for his resignation, but said he won’t step down because he wants to help repair the damage to the church. Even if he’s successful, he won’t shake the Geoghan scandal, said Thomas O’Connor, a Boston College historian and author of the book “Boston Catholics.”
“It will never leave him. It will dog him forever,” O’Connor said.
Law came to Boston after a life lived around the world. He was born in Torreon, Mexico, the only child of a U.S. Air Force colonel. Law, 70, was educated in North America, South America and the Virgin Islands before graduating from Harvard in 1953 with a degree in medieval history. He was ordained a priest in 1961.
In 1968, he took a job at the ecumenical office of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, a post that helped him chart his future as a national figure.
The position allowed him to establish numerous influential contacts with bishops and diocesan leaders around the country, said Tom Reese, editor of the Catholic magazine “America.”
Among the contacts was Cardinal William Baum, then the bishop in Washington D.C., who’d served in the obscure Springfield-Cape Girardeau diocese in Missouri, where Law was named bishop in 1973.
Baum was a high Vatican official in 1984 when Law was appointed to head the archdiocese of Boston, and thought to be influential advocate for him, Reese said. But though Law was well-connected in the Vatican, he was virtually unknown in Boston.
“Everybody said, ‘Who’s he?’ ” recalled O’Connor.
Though he was an outsider, people were willing to keep an open mind about Law, O’Connor said. He seemed open and friendly. And unlike his predecessor Humberto Medeiros, who was from the Azores, Law looked like the Irish Catholics who dominated the archdiocese.
“I think there was a sense of relief because he seemed like one of their own,” O’Connor said.
Flynn, whose first year in office was Law’s first in Boston, remembers sizing up Law during an appearance together at a new homeless shelter. Law had spoken to a man who admitted he was an alcoholic, referring him to a detox program. A few days later, Flynn called the man to see if Law had followed up, and the man told him Law phoned him personally.
“I wanted to make sure about the guy,” Flynn said. “He’s new in town, he’s an important player. I want to deal with a guy who’s on the level. He was.”
In 1985, Law enhanced his national standing and reputation as a scholar by calling for a new Catholic catechism, which explains church teachings. The catechism, which hadn’t been altered since the 16th century, was eventually republished.
His influence has only grown since his early days.
Law is part of the pope’s Congregation of Bishops, which chooses bishops. He ’s also the foreign policy architect at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and has made headlines with a trip to Cuba in 1998, to prop up the Catholic Church there, and to Israel, where he led an envoy of Catholic and Jewish leaders in 1999.
Law was also among a group of a religious leaders who met with President Bush after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, highlighting his close ties to the Bush family. One story tells how Law was able to get a call through to President Bush’s father, George H.W. Bush, on Air Force I when he served under Reagan.
But Law’s past means little in the current crisis, especially to those who want him to resign.
“The only way he can restore the church’s credibility on abuse is to leave his altar open for a successor who has both eyes wide open,” said Boston Globe columnist Derrick Jackson.
Philip Lawler, former editor of the Boston archdiocesan paper, The Pilot, said he thinks Law deliberately hid the truth, and blames an ingrained culture in the church that looks to protect itself first.
But he doesn’t think Law should resign.
“A bishop is like a father, not a corporate executive,” he said. “It’s a vocation, not a job. You can’t take off, just because things get tough.”
Law started the repair work last week when he reversed a long-standing policy and will now require the archdiocese to report even past cases of sex abuse by priests. He established an independent panel to look into church policy and also apologized for the Geoghan decision again.
“I wish I could undo what I now see to have been mistakes,” he said. “However, that is not a possibility.”
Flynn said if Law creates a credible system for reporting and preventing abuse that makes people feel safe, he can turn the Geoghan scandal into something positive.
“Then the legacy was that he faced a dramatic crisis in his administration and he stood tall,” Flynn said.