The Archbishop's Sins

"I CAN AND DO ASK PUBLICLY FOR YOUR FORGIVEness, as I have of my God." So pleaded well-respected Archbishop Robert Fortune Sanchez, 58, of Santa Fe, New Mexico, the latest Catholic cleric enmeshed in a sex scandal. Sanchez's own statement offered no specifics. But local media reported that five unnamed women say they were sexually involved with him, in some cases as teenagers. One of the five, who claims she received a quiet cash settlement from the church in 1991, said all the women had been above the age of legal consent. Even if no crimes were committed, however, Sanchez apparently violated the priestly celibacy rule, not to mention basic Christian decency. In 1990 Atlanta's Archbishop Eugene Marino became the first American of that rank ever to be forced out of office, after being caught in an affair with a woman.