On The Whole, The Maryland Jesuits Would Rather Have Accused Priest In Philadelphia

What did the Jesuits do in the early 1990s when priests were accused of, ah, sexual misconduct?

Why, our fair priestly men sent at least one to be the basketball team chaplain at Saint Joseph’s! Although a spokeswoman for the Maryland Jesuits said the allegations didn’t include contact but “asking someone to do something that makes them uncomfortable,” the Rev. H. Cornell Bradley was removed from the ministry. The new allegations come from the 1970s.

When he faced similar allegations in the 1990s, Bradley was shipped to Philadelphia.

Bradley, 69, faced other allegations in the early 1990s and was sent to residential psychiatric treatment for several months in 1993, according to the province. Health care workers deemed him fit for ministry, Pipkin said, and he was sent to Philadelphia’s St. Joseph’s University in 1995, where he stayed for a decade as campus minister and basketball team chaplain, among other positions.

That decision was a mistake, the province said in a letter sent last week to Gonzaga alumni and others Bradley worked with as a priest. The one credible substantiated allegation against him at the time — of having “a long-term, abusive sexual relationship with an adult woman,” Pipkin said — under today’s policies would have been sufficient to remove him from ministry.

Ahh, so now you won’t be able to separate “St. Joe’s basketball” and “disgraced priest” in your mind. Is this an NCAA violation, by the way?

Ex-Student Accuses Jesuit Of Misconduct [Washington Post]
Former St. Joe’s priest is focus of sex allegations [Inquirer]