Clive Charles Lynn

Sanchez wanted Lynn out of Santa Fe and preferably out of the United States. When the archdiocese later received a call from the chancellor of the diocese of Westminster London about “C. Lynn, who is a problem at a boys’ school” the person who took the call in Santa Fe noted: “better he’s in England than here.”67Note dated October 26 (no year).

Sanchez insisted that Lynn go to the House of Affirmation in Whitinsville, Massachusetts. The House of Affirmation was run by the fraudulent Rev. Thomas Kane and hosted a ring of pedophiles. However, there were some real therapists on the staff, because Lynn did not like the evaluation, which he claimed was characterized by “contradictions and sheer nonsensical statements,” “extraordinary incomprehensibility, gross ambiguity, and often enigmatic contradictions.”  Lynn called the place “a madhouse,” because he was interviewed by a “non-Catholic and lapsed Catholic chainsmoking” who criticized him for being “clerically dressed,” for going “too often to confession,” and for having “too much religiosity.”68Letter from Clive Lynn to Archbishop [Sanchez], November 1, 1985. Sanchez had sent the House a “totally ruinous letter.” Lynn dug through canon law to find rules that would force Sanchez to reinstate him and blames “Dennis” [Rev. Clay Dennis] for all his problems.

 

Lynn in March 1986 asked Sanchez for a five-year leave of absence, preferably “with monthly salary” so that Lynn could care for his aged Irish parents.69Letter from Clive Lynn to Archbishop [Sanchez], March 12, 1986. Lynn fully expected Sanchez to grant his faculties so that he could serve as a supply (fill-in) priest and make some money that way

 

But on April 18, 1986, Father Lynn was suspended from all faculties. Sanchez wrote vaguely of “a consistent pattern of your difficulties” and Lynn’s refusal “to enter into a program of therapy,” but at least Sanchez informed Lynn that “I am revoking with this letter all faculties to exercise public worship.”70Letter of Archbishop Robert F. Sanchez to Rev. Clive Lynn, April 18, 1986. Lynn’s response was to write to the Rev. Clay Dennis, who criticized Lynn in a newsclip, threatening an action for “scandal and libel in the civil courts”71Letter from Clive Lynn to Clay [Dennis], March 23, 1986. and to write Sanchez that “I have no intention…of permitting certain people to continue blasting my character” and “I simply need legal action to silence such slander.”72Letter from Clive Lynn to Archbishop Sanchez, April 29, 1986. Some archdiocesan officials saw the truth about Lynn, although their motives for acting against him were not, as we shall see, the highest.

 

Lynn left the United States. He wrote Sanchez in November 1986 that he had found “a fine teaching post in one of the schools operated by the Church” in Paisley, Scotland, and asked Sanchez for a letter giving him permission to work in another diocese. Without such a letter Lynn might lose his school job, and therefore might have “to return at once for your help and hopeful appointment in the archdiocese.”73Letter from Clive Lynn to Archbishop Sanchez, November 20, 1986. Sanchez did not give in to this threat. Osgood then showed up in Leeds, England. The bishop there wrote to Sanchez to inquire about Lynn’s status. Sanchez replied that “Father Lynn was suspended from all faculties,” that is, he could not function as a priest. Sanchez also told the truth about Lynn: “social workers had investigated and substantiated allegations of sexual misconduct with children by Fr. Lynn.” Sanchez had ordered Lynn to undergo treatment, and Lynn refused. Sanchez claimed to be “anxious for Fr. Lynn to return.”74Letter from Archbishop Robert F. Sanchez to Bishop David Konstant of Leeds, England, January 13, 1987.

 

Sanchez and Lynn deserved each other. They played a game of ecclesiastical chicken. Sanchez was aware that both Social Services and the District Attorney knew that Lynn was a sexual abuser; presumably the District Attorney had expected Sanchez to deal with the problem. Sanchez’s solution was to get Lynn out of Santa Fe, out of New Mexico, and out of the United Sates. Lynn wanted a declaration that he was in good standing. Sanchez could not give this because too many people knew of the abuse. Had he consulted an attorney, an attorney might well have warned Sanchez that if he gave a letter testifying to Lynn’s good character, and Lynn used this letter to obtain a position in which he abused boys, Sanchez might well be found an accessory before the fact to a felony.

 

Sanchez therefore dug in his heels and refused to give Lynn a letter saying he was a priest in good standing. Lynn lamented “the cruel injustice my own bp. seems to insist in inflicting upon me,”  then said that without such a letter he could not get a job in Great Britain, and would have to return to Santa Fe for an assignment. Lynn blamed Archbishop Sanchez’s advisors (Clay Dennis, M. O’Brien, Johnny Lee [Sanchez]), and proposed that Archbishop Sanchez give him a letter and that those malicious advisors need never know about it.75Letter from Clive Lynn to Archbishop Sanchez, July 6, 1987. Archbishop Sanchez did not take the bait.

 

Sanchez admitted to Bishop Konstant about Lynn that “allegations of sexual misconduct with minors are still existent” and that “future lawsuits in this regard are possible in the civil courts, as well as the possibility of a criminal charge being made.” But Sanchez praised Bishop Konstant for his “patience and compassion,” and speculated that perhaps Lynn would do better in his own “cultural environment,” and wondered  “Bishop Konstant, if you have in mind a possible beginning of a process for Father Lynn of incardination into your diocese” Sanchez assured Konstant “If…you are willing to initiate a process toward incardination, I would be ready to excardinate him.” 76Letter from Archbishop Robert F. Sanchez to Bishop David Konstant, December 3, 1987. Konstant said no: “there is no question of his being incardinated into this diocese.”77Letter from Bishop David Konstant to Archbishop Robert F. Sanchez, January 4, 1988. He also informed Sanchez that he had told Lynn “it is essential for him to return to his own diocese as soon as possible in order to clarify face to face with you what his position is.”78Letter from Bishop David Konstant to Archbishop Robert F. Sanchez, March 7, 1988. Lynn kept threatening to return to Santa Fe because Sanchez’s refusal to give him a letter of recommendation kept Lynn from getting the positions he wanted, especially positions in a Catholic boys’ school. Sanchez of course did not want Lynn in the jurisdiction of American courts and police.

 

On October 12, 1989 the Archdiocese of Santa Fe agreed to pay $554,000 as settlement of a lawsuit that alleged that Lynn had abused a nine-year-old boy at St. Gertrude’s in Mora during 1978 and 1979. The victim’s attorney, Anthony Fontana, said that Sanchez “seemed concerned for his client and claimed ‘no knowledge of this stuff going on before.’”79“Archdiocese Attorney Says He Opposed Settlement Secrecy,” New Mexican, March 31, 1993.

Lynn was always threatening to sue people who criticized him. Even after the 1989 settlement of the lawsuit, Lynn had a lawyer attempt to extract a letter from Sanchez testifying to Lynn’s status. The lawyer, Thomas R. Orr, in 1990 wrote Sanchez about the “false accusation being circulated by a certain individual in Mora County to the effect that payments allegedly received by him from the Archdiocese are “hush money” relating in some way to Father Lynn. Orr continued that “Father Lynn has not in any way been involved in incidents which would justify making such payments to any person, and is entitled to your complete cooperation in defending his good name and standing with the Church,” and therefore, “we make demand that he be provided with the letter that he has requested, in the form attached hereto,” or Orr would “take steps.” The letter that Orr insisted Sanchez sign indicated that “Father Lynn is man of virtue and honor" and “Father Lynn has my full blessing to both teach and administer the sacraments with full faculties.”80Letter from Thomas R. Orr to Archbishop Robert F. Sanchez, July 19, 1990.

 

Sanchez of course refused, and wrote that “Father Lynn’s priestly faculties remain suspended” and that this was “an internal ecclesiastical matter” and therefore would not “fall within the jurisdiction of the civil lawyers or the civil courts.”81Letter from Archbishop Robert F. Sanchez to Thomas R. Orr, July30, 1990.

 

To add insult to injury, Lynn somehow convinced Opus Dei in Ireland that he was a good, conservative priest. Therefore, according to a postcard that Lynn sent Sanchez, “I am privileged to concelebrate Mass with the Holy Father at 10 AM tomorrow (17^th) at the beatification of Josemaria Escriva, a gift I received from Opus Dei in Ireland.” With this stamp of approval, he repeats his request to Sanchez: “Will you please give me a written note re permission to minister” 82Postcard from Rev. Clive Lynn to Archbishop Robert Sanchez, May 16, 1992. Abusers, when they can, try to associate themselves with some revered figure (the Pope, Mother Angelica, Mother Teresa) in order to establish their bona fides.

 

Later that year Chancellor Rev. Ron Wolf of Santa Fe wrote to the Apostolic Nuncio in Great Britain that Fr. Clive Lynn “is a known pedophile.” Wolf expressed concern “for the welfare of young persons in your area,”83Letter from Rev. Ron Wolf to Bishop Barbarito Luigi, Apostolic Pro-Nuncio to Great Britain, July 28, 1993. Wolf sent an identical letter to Msgr. Gerada Emanuela, Apostolic Nuncio to Ireland, August 25, 1993. but, of course, if the archdiocese of Santa Fe had turned Lynn over for prosecution, he would not have had the chance to molest anyone else.

 

The Chancellor, Ron Wolf, in a memo contemplated laicizing Lynn, but realized that canon law put a serious obstacle in the way. Canon law provides that if a delict (a crime) was in part caused by illness, the penalty must be reduced. Perhaps the writers were thinking of organic disease, such as a brain tumor, or of alcoholism. But the concept of disease has been extended to other proclivities, and Wolf notes that “on the case of Clive Lynn he [Rev. Michael Cote, canonical consultant at the Apostolic Nunciature] says it might be difficult to do a canonical process. The concern he brings out is the imputability of the person if pedophilia is indeed an illness.”84Memorandum from Rev. Manuel Viera, Judicial Vicar to Rev. Ron Wolf, Chancellor, November 12, 1992.

 

Although Wolf had expressed concern for the safety of children in Great Britain, this concern did not find expression in any actions of archdiocesan officials. Sanchez had ignored the 1980 warnings of Brother Thomas Coleman, and had not insisted that the District Attorney prosecute Lynn after Social Services had substantiated numerous allegations. An investigation in 1980 or a prosecution in 1985 would have ended Lynn’s career as a molester, and the implication is strong that Sanchez asked the District Attorney not to prosecute and promised to get Lynn out of New Mexico.

 

Sanchez wanted Lynn far away, outside of the reach of American law, and preferably outside Sanchez’s responsibility. Sanchez’s personal corruption may have contributed to his carelessness about the safety of children; but other bishops who apparently were celibate acted the same way. Sanchez did not want bad publicity, and he knew that Rome would not cooperate in defrocking Lynn.

 

The extraordinary indifference that the Archdiocese of Santa Fe showed toward the safety of children was, alas, not unusual. Priests were protected from the law and given a sense of immunity. Priests know that bishops disliked public confrontations, and Lynn manipulated this dislike. In Santa Fe the personal corruption of Archbishop Robert Sanchez made things worse, but Santa Fe was not extraordinary. Court cases and grand jury investigations showed similar toleration of abuse in Boston, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles.

 

Lynn’s traditionalist Catholicism was probably not simply a mask he used to get sex and money to finance sex. His style of Irish Catholicism emphasized obedience and control, and attracted the type of personality that wanted to control people, to make them into obedient marionettes. Sexual control is the most initiate form of control.

 

I have also noted the numerous mentions of the devil that recur in the history of Clive Lynn. The devil is the ape of God, and Lynn was the ape of a traditional Irish Catholic priest. Those priests were, whatever their faults of rigidity, often chaste and benevolent. Catholics in New Mexico after Vatican II so thirsted for the old, secure ways that they, or at least some of them, were willing to turn a blind eye to Lynn’s erratic behavior and to his unusual interest in boys.