Priest

The Archdiocese of Los Angeles has quietly added two dozen priests and brothers to its list of clergy accused of child molestation. Though the church deems the allegations against the men credible, the archdiocese has declined to release information about the complaints, including the number of accusers, the dates of the alleged abuse and the parishes where the men worked. The names were disclosed in a two-page report posted on the archdiocese's website last month alongside 12,000 pages of internal records related to its handling of abuse claims.

Time and again in his papacy, Pope Benedict XVI spoke out against the scourge of child sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests, using words that would have been scarcely imaginable by his predecessors. It was, he said, "evil," "gravely immoral," "a terrifying sign of the times. " He spoke of the "deep shame" and "humiliation" the scandal had brought on the Catholic Church. He apologized to victims. Not long into his tenure, Benedict essentially banished an influential Mexican priest, Father Marcial Maciel, who had long been suspected of sexually abusing seminarians and boys in his care and had fathered at least three children.

The files released last week by America's largest Catholic archdiocese revealed new and disturbing details about how church officials schemed to protect priests accused of molesting children. But was the scandal in Los Angeles really so much worse than in other places? Sadly, no. The details emerging from the documents mirror what happened in archdioceses across the country, as church officials time and again put their own concerns above the needs of victims. One of the earliest cases to draw nationwide attention involved Gilbert Gauthe, a priest who raped dozens of boys in rural Louisiana.

For a long time, the story of the four chaplains was everywhere. In classrooms, posters showed the men of different faiths, arms linked in prayer, braced against the waves engulfing the deck of their torpedoed troop ship on Feb. 3, 1943. They had given their life preservers to frantic soldiers and urged troops paralyzed with fear to jump into the icy North Atlantic before they were sucked down by the sinking ship's whirlpool. A postage stamp in 1948 honored the two Protestant ministers, the Catholic priest and the rabbi.

Officials at Los Angeles Unified School District knew that a former priest it hired as a community organizer had been accused of molestation but decided to keep him on the job, according to interviews and records reviewed by The Times. Both L.A. Unified administrators and school police discussed the accusations against Joseph Pina, and were aware in 2002 that the L.A. County Sheriff's Department was investigating Pina for alleged child molestation months after the district had hired him. Records indicate that school officials concluded that Pina should be removed from his job only if he were charged - or possibly convicted - of a crime.

In the midst of renewed public outrage over its handling of clergy sex abuse, the Los Angeles Archdiocese is considering a $200-million fundraising campaign that could erase debts brought on by the scandal. The archdiocese has hired a New York company, Guidance In Giving Inc., to study the feasibility of a large-scale fundraiser that would shore up a bottom line hit hard by costly abuse litigation. It would be the archdiocese's first capital campaign in 60 years. The archdiocese's $660-million settlement in 2007 with more than 500 victims was the largest in U.S. history.

The release of thousands of pages of church files showing how Cardinal Roger M. Mahony and other top Los Angeles Archdiocese officials dealt with priest molestation cases has generated outrage and anguish at parishes across Southern California. But for victims of abuse, there is also the pain of learning details of how top church leaders tried to cover up the scandal. Matt Severson says that as a boy, he was abused by Father Michael Baker. Severson was a plaintiff in the record civil settlement over church abuse a few years ago. The release of the files has him reliving what happened decades ago. "It's deeply disheartening to read these files.

A former priest and suspected child molester left employment with the Los Angeles archdiocese to work for the L.A. Unified School District, officials confirmed Sunday. The former clergyman, Joseph Pina, did not work with children in his school district job, L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy said. He added that, as a result of the disclosures, Pina would no longer be employed by the nation's second-largest school system. Over the weekend, Deasy was unable to pull together Pina's full employment history, but said the district already was looking into the matter of Pina's hiring.

As horrifying as it is to note, the timing of the HBO documentary "Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God," which premieres Monday night, could not have been better if divine intervention were involved. Last week, the Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles released documents chronicling how Cardinal Roger M. Mahony and other church officials managed to thwart investigations into the sexual abuse of hundreds of local children to protect the accused priests. To which this film by Oscar winner Alex Gibney essentially says, "If you think that's bad, watch this.

An ex-priest who allegedly admitted a sexual relationship with a minor remained employed by the Los Angeles Unified School District for more than a decade despite several warning flags about his background, according to interviews and records. Joseph Pina is also said in internal church documents to have admitted to repeated “boundary issues” with women throughout his career in the clergy. An internal 1993 psychological evaluation by the L.A. Archdiocese concluded that Pina “remains a serious risk for acting out.” Nine years later, L.A. Unified hired him as a community outreach coordinator for its $19.5-billion school-construction effort.