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If you are going to persist in attacking any of the rare Catholic Bishops in America who actually believe and practice Catholicism, do you really think that people should refrain from going after Bishop Delaney?

Please state publicly the ground rules that you think should apply among Catholics on responding to your posts against Archbishop Eldon Curtiss of Omaha and Archbishop Myers of Newark and Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz and whether we may feel free to point out the shortcomings of Bishop Delaney.

Is there a common rule that you envision as to all of these prelates or is Delaney a special case not to be criticized in return? If so, what makes him so special and why?

You have never failed to criticize Bishop Delaney, at every opportunity. Be my guest. He's had some very questionable dealings with some priest "friends" of his whom he moved into the Fort Worth diocese, who were found to have later molested young men.

He acted the same way Curtiss, and Myers, and two-thirds of the American bishops acted when faced with these accusations: they were more concerned about potentially abusive priests than they were about teenage children.

So, have at him. Just don't accuse me of covering for him, because I'm not covering for him. If you want to drag every newspaper article that's ever been written about him onto Free Republic, you're welcome to, and I'll agree with all of them.

But I am not responsible for Bishop Delaney; your past criticisms have always attempted to somehow link me to his corruptions.

I'm the one, BTW, who told him, in 1988, about one of the most senior monsignors in this diocese who made a pass at me when I was in the seminary (he kissed me on the lips; hell, my father never kissed me in his entire life, nor has any other man), and nobody at the seminary would believe that he would do such a thing; I was laughed at. Delaney didn't laugh, and when, a year later, the monsignor mocked a young priest from the pulpit for having a drinking problem, Delaney retired him the very next day.

Bishop Delaney's been very good to me, and he's now dying of pancreatic cancer. But, I won't defend someone who's looked the other way while children were being abused.