Morning Catholic must-reads

A welter of articles defending the Pope’s handling of the abuse crisis have appeared in the wake of Fr Thomas Brundage’s revealing article on the “Murphy case”. Here are some notable ones: Archbishop Timothy Dolan, Archbishop Vincent Nichols, Archbishop Thomas Collins, Archbishop Henryk Muszynski, the Executive Committee of the USCCB, Bill Donohue, the Anchoress, Jimmy Akin and Bess Twiston-Davies.

Andrew Brown says the Pope is not as powerful as many non-Catholics assume he is.

Tom McNichol of the Atlantic compares the abuse scandal to Watergate, dubbing it “papalgate“.

David Clohessy, director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), doesn’t want Benedict XVI to resign. Kenneth Briggs disagrees.

And Sean Curnyn of First Things is transported by Johnny Cash’s biblically inspired last recording.