A while back, I came across an article that offered the best explanation of this. Unfortunately, I forgot to bookmark it. According to the journalist, during the war years, when the communists wanted to destroy someone's credibility, they would accuse him of being a homosexual. JPII, he claimed, upon learning that certain high ranking church leaders were homosexual, dismissed these claims as efforts by others to denigrate them.
"JPII, he claimed, upon learning that certain high ranking church leaders were homosexual, dismissed these claims as efforts by others to denigrate them."
I guess that's plausible, but it is not, ultimately, satisfying.
How many times can you dismiss charges on those grounds without starting to wonder if there's truth to them? Was he so insulated that the information never reached him? And if so, was that not negligence?