“Only when a licensed psychologist or psychiatrist determined the priest was capable of returning to ministry without reoffending did we consider placing the priest back in ministry,” he added. “The professional advice we received was well-intended but flawed, and I deeply regret that we followed it.”
Bishop Hubbard led the diocese from 1977 until 2014, when he was succeeded by current Bishop Edward Scharfenberger. Hubbard currently faces a Vos Estis investigation, a Vatican-ordered investigation into allegations that he committed sexual abuse. The 2019 document Vos Estis lux Mundi contained Pope Francis’ norms for investigating allegations of episcopal misconduct.
An anonymous plaintiff in March filed a lawsuit against Hubbard, alleging that Hubbard molested him in 1977, soon after his installation as bishop. The lawsuit named the diocese as well as St. Edward the Confessor Catholic Church in Clifton Park, New York.
The diocesan communications director told CNA at the time of the lawsuit that Hubbard maintained he had never abused a child.
Hubbard’s statement to the Times-Union came in response to an investigation by the newspaper, which reported a pattern of priests with abuse allegations being removed from ministry for treatment, only to be reinstated to active ministry without law enforcement being notified. Some of those priests allegedly went on to commit abuse once back in active ministry.
In one case, a woman testified in a deposition before diocesan attorneys that her nephew had been abused by a priest of the diocese around 1983. Her nephew killed himself, she recalled, and she subsequently contacted the diocese and reached Bishop Hubbard. The bishop allegedly told her he was aware of the alleged abuse, and that the priest in question was “being sent to New Mexico where they have more respect for priests.”
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