Yakima bishop to skip pope visit

YAKIMA – Roman Catholic Bishop Carlos A. Sevilla says he won’t attend the pope’s U.S. visit this week but not in response to the concerns of two advocacy groups for people who say they were sexually abused by priests.

Sevilla, who was asked on Thursday by Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests and Voice of the Faithful to forgo the trip to Washington, D.C., as penance for failure to notify parishioners in a number of abuse cases, said Sunday he was staying in the diocese because he had been asked to participate in the funeral for the mother of a diocesan employee.

In his news release, Sevilla also acknowledged Sunday he could have been more forthcoming after Rev. Juan Estrada, a former pastor in the central Washington diocese who pleaded guilty in 2003 to sexually abusing a teenage girl in northeastern Oregon, left the diocese. The case of Estrada was cited in the letter.

“Should I have publicized Father Estrada’s conviction? Perhaps so,” Sevilla said, “but I certainly didn’t hide it.”