“A bad tree cannot bear good fruit”.

Philip said, “The Church has endured many trials. She always emerges stronger. And she always outlives her persecutors and opponents”.

Is it because God somehow is protecting this institution? Or is it more likely that, after centuries of hiding things, they have become masters of the art of obfuscation, itself a form of evil?

In September 2003, a grand jury of local citizens released a report detailing a sad history of sexual abuse by priests of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. That abuse was known, tolerated, and hidden by high church officials, up to and including the Cardinal himself. The previous grand jury was frustrated that it could not charge either the abusers or their protectors in the church, because the successful cover-up of the abuse resulted in the expiration of the statute of limitations.