New York Bishop Suggests Teen Was an ‘accomplice’ When Priest Molested Him: ‘The Boy Is Culpable’
A Syracuse bishop objected to a news report that accurately quoted his remarks blaming victims of child-molesting priests for their own sex abuse.
Bishop Robert Cunningham testified in a 2011 deposition as part of a federal lawsuit filed by a man accusing a priest of sexually abusing him years earlier as a child, reported the Post-Standard.
The plaintiff’s attorney asked Cunningham, who heads the Syracuse diocese, whether a child molested by a priest has committed a sin in the eyes of the church.
“The boy is culpable,” Cunningham said during the Oct. 14, 2011, sworn deposition.
The bishop backed away from that statement later in the deposition but said he would need more information about the child’s behavior to determine his culpability.
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