Monsignor Thomas Kane gave the same sermon four times at St. Patrick's Church in Rockville last Sunday, and at each Mass the parishioners did something he says he had never seen in his 50 years as a priest. They stood and applauded.
Kane's message was that despite a sexual abuse scandal that has spread across the country, the Roman Catholic priesthood as a whole is still worthy of admiration.
"You are not to be disillusioned," said the broad-shouldered pastor, who looks like an aging football player. "We know we have our problems, but we have a priesthood that is as dedicated and holy and generous as ever it was."
The standing ovation was not just for Kane's homily, but for him personally, parishioner Joan Liegey said later. "He has taken this whole thing very hard. . . . I think he needed a little reassurance that we were with him," she explained.
Throughout the country, Catholics are responding in sometimes paradoxical ways to a crisis of trust in the church. They are reaching out to support the clergymen they know and admire, while expressing an excruciating feeling of betrayal by the church's more distant and opaque leadership.
Some are withholding financial contributions to bishops' annual appeals in this Lenten season, while still giving to their local churches in Sunday collections.
Many are demanding greater accountability from the church, and not just in regard to pedophilia. The latest buzzword in Catholic institutions of higher learning is "clericalism," a pejorative term for an allegedly in-grown elite that is increasingly out of sync with the laity's views on contraception, homosexuality and the role of women in the church.
Yet there is little evidence of a general falling away of faith.
"Ordinary people make a distinction between the church as mystery of belief and as a bureaucracy. People haven't lost faith in the church . . . but they have lost faith in the bureaucracy," said Eugene Kennedy, a professor of psychology and scholar of the priesthood at Loyola University.
Last week, the Archdiocese of Boston settled the massive civil lawsuit that triggered the scandal, agreeing to pay up to $30 million to 86 plaintiffs who alleged that they or their children were molested by former priest John J. Geoghan. But the settlement did not put the issue to rest.
Dozens of additional plaintiffs have come forward alleging abuse by Geoghan and other Massachusetts priests. Declaring a "zero tolerance" policy, Boston's Cardinal Bernard F. Law suspended 10 clergymen and notified prosecutors of molestation allegations against 80 others over four decades.
Yet calls for Law's resignation have been growing since the Boston Globe went to court to unseal documents showing that the cardinal and five bishops moved Geoghan from parish to parish after learning of his pedophilia. Last week, the Boston Herald, the Globe's more conservative rival, editorialized for Law to step down.
From Boston, the scandal has widened almost daily. More than 80 priests in 11 states have been accused this year of sexual abuse of children. In Los Angeles, Cardinal Roger Mahony said he had dismissed as many as a dozen priests and turned their names over to police for investigation. The Archdiocese of Philadelphia said it had credible evidence of abuse by 35 priests over a half-century. In Florida, Bishop Anthony O'Connell resigned after admitting he had molested a teenager 27 years ago.
While the charges mount, prosecutors have said there is often little they can do in decades-old cases. The most serious charges against Geoghan -- two counts of child rape -- were dismissed by a Boston judge who ruled that the statute of limitations had expired. Similarly, a California judge last week dismissed all 224 charges against a San Francisco priest accused of molesting nine boys decades ago.
The scandal also has an international side. In Ireland, the church agreed this year to pay $110 million to about 3,000 victims. Pedophilia cases have roiled Canada, Australia, Britain, France and Austria. The Vatican is investigating molestation charges against an archbishop in Poland. And in Mexico, the Rev. Marcial Maciel, revered founder of the Legion of Christ, a powerful movement within Catholicism, has been accused by several men of molesting them in the 1950s.
Some Catholics view the worldwide scandal as an opportunity for fundamental changes, such as ordaining women and eliminating the requirement of celibacy for priests.
"I think this is like a second Reformation, this is like Martin Luther," said Leland White, a lawyer in Virginia who has filed a civil suit alleging that he was abused by a priest as a 14-year-old in Newport, R.I.
The official newspaper of the Archdiocese of Boston said Friday that the church needs an open discussion of the number of gay priests, the exclusion of women from the priesthood and what to do about celibacy.
"These questions are out there in the minds of Catholics, more so in the United States than elsewhere," the editorial said. "They have been answered in the past, but now these questions have taken on a deeper intensity in more Catholic minds than prior to these sexual scandals."
But many Catholics think far-reaching changes are either unnecessary or unlikely, at least under Pope John Paul II, a staunch conservative on such matters. They note that this is hardly the first time in recent years that sexual abuse has reverberated through the church.
In 1984, a Louisiana priest, Gilbert Gauthe, was charged with raping dozens of boys. Four years later, the Rev. Rudolph Kos was sentenced to life in prison for sexually assaulting children in Dallas. And in 1992, the Rev. James Porter was accused of molesting up to 200 children in Fall River, Mass.
Those cases led to reforms in many, but not all, dioceses. In 1993, the Archdiocese of Washington set a policy of informing civil authorities of sexual abuse allegations, and in 1995, it removed four priests accused of molesting altar boys in the 1960s and 1970s. But dioceses in Massachusetts, New York and elsewhere continued to resist similar policies.
The difference this time, said Monsignor Thomas M. Duffy, pastor of Church of the Blessed Sacrament in Washington, is the "shocking numbers" of priests accused in Boston and evidence that higher-ups were aware of the allegations.
"I thought by the mid-'90s, bishops and dioceses were beginning to get a handle on it. And then suddenly it comes to the fore again in 2002," Duffy said. "Catholics are very embarrassed. Priests certainly are."
Across the country, Catholic lay leaders and parishioners have gathered in emotional "listening sessions" to air their concerns and seek solace. Churchgoers say they are facing delicate questions: Should their children be altar servers? Should they put money on the collection plate without knowing for sure where it will go?
Bonnie Ciambotti, 48, of Newton, Mass., said she thinks Law should resign, yet she remains loyal to her own priest. She is not worried about her daughter being an altar server or even going on a retreat to prepare for confirmation, and she is considering how to give money so that it will stay within her parish.
"There is a unanimous feeling that our parish priests are feeling very isolated, and it seems every parish wants to support their own priest," she said.
In New Hampshire, the Rev. Bartholomew Leon of St. George Maronite Church, a tiny parish of about 50 families, said he has been buoyed by letters and e-mails of support from his congregation. But he now is cautious about all dealings with children.
"I love kids, they come and hug me, but I'm never in a room [alone] with a child," he said. "If I do have to hear a confession of a child, we do it in a chapel and the chapel is visible to everyone."
Many Catholics worry that the scandal will further reduce the number of men entering the clergy, which has steadily declined in the United States from 58,600 priests in 1965 to 45,200 last year.
"This has already hurt recruitment and driven some young men away from the seminary and priesthood," said Scott Appleby, director of the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism at Notre Dame.
Another likely impact is on finances. The Archdiocese of Boston has said its insurance policies will not fully cover its $30 million settlement with Geoghan's victims, and it is considering selling properties to raise funds. Huge liability claims could have a ripple effect on many dioceses -- even those facing no allegations -- by driving up insurance costs.
Joseph Claude Harris, a Seattle researcher who tracks charitable giving to the church, said it is too soon to tell whether the current scandal will affect contributions. But he said past scandals apparently have not: Donations to the nation's 18,500 parishes have risen about 3.5 percent a year over the past decade, to $7 billion to $8 billion annually.