Church sex investigator resigns

The Church is struggling to deal with sexual abuse scandals worldwide

The outspoken head of a panel investigating alleged sexual abuse by US priests has resigned after accusing bishops of blocking his work.

Frank Keating, who heads the national lay review board, compared unnamed bishops to the Mafia last week.

"To act like La Cosa Nostra and hide and suppress, I think, is very unhealthy," he told the Los Angeles Times.

The archbishop of Los Angeles, Roger Mahony, rejected Mr Keating's comment as "irresponsible and uninformed".

Mr Keating, a former governor of the US state of Oklahoma and a practising Catholic, was charged with heading a lay committee investigating widespread allegations that many priests had abused parishioners - especially children - over decades.

His resignation has been met dismay from some Catholic pressure groups.

Voice of the Faithful's spokeswoman Luise Dittrich said the move, coming on the heels of such a public dispute with Archbishop Mahony, "casts doubt on who's running the show".

"He wasn't afraid to speak the truth in his own way," she told BBC News Online. "His resignation puts pressure on the board" to prove its independence from the Church, she said.

Obstacles

Under Mr Keating's leadership, the board commissioned a survey of bishops across America.

Governor Keating's remarks, as quoted today in the Los Angeles Times, were both irresponsible and uninformed

Cardinal Roger Mahony

Mr Keating said 61 of the 195 dioceses had not responded, adding that some bishops were behaving more like members of a criminal organisation than a religious one.

Cardinal Mahony criticised the survey, mainly on technical grounds, in a statement on his website.

But Mr Keating repeated the allegation of obfuscation in his letter of resignation, which the Associated Press published on Monday.

"My remarks, which some bishops found offensive, were deadly accurate. I make no apology," he said.

"To resist grand jury subpoenas, to suppress the names of offending clerics, to deny, to obfuscate, to explain away; that is the model of a criminal organisation, not my church," he said.

Mr Keating said in his resignation letter than he had been planning to step down this month anyway, a year after he was appointed.

But the very public manner of his departure puts the issue of sex abuse back in the spotlight - just days before US bishops meet 19-20 June for their twice-a-year conference.

Thousands of people across the United States are suing various dioceses for millions of dollars in damages, alleging that the Church protected priests accused of abusing children.