Dallas - A senior Dallas priest who said parents shared responsibility for the sexual abuse of 11 altar boys by another priest has retired after an outcry over his comments.
Monsignor Robert Rehkemper (73) has resigned as pastor of All Saints' Church, becoming the first official in the Dallas diocese to step down after a jury last month ordered it to pay a record $119.6 million (£82.5 million) damages to the abused former altar boys.
Monsignor Rehkemper said: "They [the parents] more properly should have known because they're close to the kids. I don't want to judge them one way or the other, but it doesn't appear they were very concerned about their kids," he told the Dallas Morning News. Referring to the victims, he said: "They knew what was right and what was wrong . . . It's hard for me to believe why they kept quiet for so long." - (Reuter)