William P. Leahy
William P. Leahy
William P. Leahy, SJis the 25th President of Boston College, a post he has held since 1996. He was born in Omaha, Nebraska and raised in Imogene, Iowa. He joined the Society of Jesus in 1967, and is a member of the Jesuits' Wisconsin province. Leahy earned a bachelor's degree in philosophy and a master's degree in United States history at Saint Louis University in 1972 and 1975, respectively. He then began studies at the Jesuit School of Theology at...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionEducator
CountryUnited States of America
badly hierarchy states united
I would be with those who say the hierarchy in the United States has badly mishandled this whole situation.
church deal hierarchy lay maybe men regard understand viewpoint women
What I think we can do is help individuals understand the church teaching, but also maybe help the church understand the viewpoint of lay men and women about what they want in regard to priests, or how do they want the hierarchy to deal with them?
forgiveness errors hierarchy
I would say the hierarchy has made terrible errors in judgment and it has to seek forgiveness by its members.
across anticipate bishop country local means screening teaching
By no means do I anticipate screening those who come on to campus... And I have no difficulty if a bishop across the country or some local pastor may say that's not Catholic teaching - that's fine.
catholic opportunity renew
This is a crisis, but there is an opportunity to help revitalize and renew the Catholic community.
members
Others don't want to listen to viewpoints that members of the church have.
work
I think we can work through a lot of these issues.
bringing huge reforms
As a university, we're not focused on bringing about huge reforms - that's not our role.
elsewhere hard hit sexual
You know how the church has been hit so hard by the sexual misconduct by clergy, and what's that's done to Catholics, especially here in Boston but elsewhere as well.
Individuals will speak their minds, which I think is healthy.
best
I say let's respond as best we can to the victims and their families.
individual-differences challenges unity
The challenge for the church is how do we have unity about basic beliefs and yet respect individual differences.
thinking church individual
Clearly there are individuals who don't understand what the church teaches, or they think it's so limiting.
community catholic church
BC is not going to replace the hierarchy, and BC is not going to lead some major reform in the Catholic Church - that's got to come out of the whole Catholic community.