Still Running Off at the Keyboard

The decision by Vatican officials to have Cardinal Bernard Law preside over a high-profile mourning Mass for the late pope is the latest example of the chasm that separates how senior Vatican officials view the priest sex-abuse scandal and the way many American Catholics see it.

While Pope John Paul II and other senior Vatican officials repeatedly condemned child sex abuse by priests and endorsed American bishops' efforts to combat it, church officials in Rome never saw the revelations as the kind of confidence-shattering, life-changing event that many Americans did.

Some senior church officials - including Honduran Cardinal Oscar Andres Rodriguez, who's considered a strong papal candidate - continually suggested that the scandal was a creation of the American news media.