Cardinal Law: 'I had other things to do'

The mounting sexual abuse scandal has fueled calls for Law's resignation and led to this week's Vatican meeting.

ROME, Italy (CNN) -- Cardinal Bernard Law, the beleaguered head of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston, tersely defended his absence at a news conference earlier this week capping a summit of U.S. cardinals with Pope John Paul II.

"I had other things to do," he said Thursday.

The pope called the historic two-day meeting following a wave of allegations that church leaders failed to shield children from clergy accused of sexual abuse and instead covered up allegations and transferred accused priests. The meeting ended Wednesday.

Law, the senior figure among U.S. bishops, has been at the center of the controversy since January, when revelations came out that he moved former priest John Geoghan -- now in prison for molesting an 11-year-old boy -- from parish to parish even though he knew of allegations Geoghan had abused children.

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Earlier this month, documents showed the cardinal repeatedly transferred the Rev. Paul Shanley, another former Boston-area priest who is accused of sexually abusing 30 minors, despite numerous allegations. Law apologized to parishioners last weekend for responding too slowly to these and other problems.

Several newspapers and parishioners had called for Law's resignation, a subject he told reporters Thursday "never came up" at the Vatican meeting.

Explaining his absence at Wednesday's late-night news conference, Law said, "A number of us were not [there]. It was rather late, you know. I had other things to do."

At the press briefing, attended by two bishops and one of the 12 U.S. cardinals who attended the summit, church leaders issued a communique saying they would seek to dismiss any "notorious" priest found guilty of "serial, predatory, sexual abuse of minors."

But the statement did not endorse a zero-tolerance policy, in which no instance of molestation would be tolerated.

Speaking at Rome's Fiumicino Airport on his way home to Boston, Law said he and the other cardinals helped draft the statement, but admitted he had not read the final version. He said he was "particularly grateful for the [pope's] open talk" during the meeting.

"I thought it was excellent," he said. "Very good spirit, very frank, very open."

Law said that protecting children was the "number one priority" of his archdiocese.

"I think the policy we have in place is very good," he said. "We just need to find good ways of implementing different segments of that policy, and we're trying to do that."

Bishop Wilton Gregory, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, who attended the Vatican meeting, said Wednesday that the sexual abuse issue will be a priority at the bishops' general meeting this June in Dallas, Texas.