Faithful Furious Over Tactic

William Lobdell wrote in the August 3, 2005 Los Angeles Times on a defense raised by an attorney retained by the Archciocese of Portland to defend Fr. Arturo Uribe against a claim for increased child support.

In her relationship with Arturo Uribe, then a seminarian and now a Whittier priest, the child's mother had engaged "in unprotected intercourse ... when [she] should have known that could result in pregnancy," the church maintained in its answer to the lawsuit.

The lawyer says he doubts then-Archbishop Levada saw a copy of the pleading.

He said his best recollection about the proceeding was that he worked exclusively with the risk management department for the Archdiocese of Portland.

As if that helps.

"Whether a bishop likes it or not, he has ultimate responsibility for a legal argument made on his behalf or upon behalf of his diocese," said Father Richard McBrien, a theology professor at the University of Notre Dame. "Archbishop Levada would have - or certainly should have - known what his lawyers were arguing on his behalf."

Fr. McBrien is right.

(via Get Religion)