An external investigation will examine both the accusations against former Zahm Hall Rector, Rev. Thomas King, C.S.C., and Notre Dame’s handling of past complaints against the priest.
Introduction
In a terse September 24th statement, the University announced the opening of an investigation by an outside attorney into “allegations that Rev. Thomas King, C.S.C., engaged in sexual misconduct while rector of Zahm Hall, where he served from 1980 to 1997.”
The statement unaccountably did not mention that the investigation will include an examination of “the University’s handling of any past complaints regarding Fr. King,” as the University’s president and board chairman said in a letter accompanying the statement.
In that letter, which initially went to past residents of Zahm Hall, Rev. Robert A. Dowd, C.S.C., and board chair John Veihmeyer announced the creation of a special board committee to oversee the investigation and expressed sadness “that there are members of our community who may have suffered abuse while here and may not have received the support, care, and love they deserve.”
Neither the statement nor the letter says anything about Father King, but several sources report he is in a South Bend nursing home in poor health. He began his career teaching at Notre Dame High School in Niles, Illinois, in 1969. He moved to Notre Dame in 1979 to serve as rector of Zahm Hall and to teach history at Holy Cross College. He left after 17 years to serve as a parish priest in two parishes until retiring in 2020. He appears to be in good standing as a priest.
What Can Be Said
Details are, understandably sparse, but this much can be said:
- The outside counsel, Helen Cantwell, a partner in the prominent New York law firm of Debevoise & Plimpton, has had extensive experience in handling high profile investigations into alleged misconduct by employees of various organizations and institutions.
- While the university has not described the allegations, some charges have been leveled on the Internet. We describe them below as background to the announced investigation, but we emphasize we know nothing and imply nothing about these claims other than that they have been made.
First, there is this Facebook posting from a 1998 graduate who is now on the faculty of Tufts University:
I’m leading a group of Notre Dame guys who were hazed, harassed, raped and assaulted by Zahm Hall rector Father Thomas King, C.S.C. who not only lived in a dorm with hundreds of young men, but also held the keys to the “Rudy Program” for boys who wanted to transfer to ND from Holy Cross where he was a professor for decades. We’ve collected scores of stories and are curious to hear more. DM me with details or a link to the anonymous reporting line.
In another Facebook post, he asserted that Notre Dame “knew about the abuse as early as 1995/96.”
- There are also a number of 2023 posts about Father King by “hailmaryfullofgrease” (HMFG) on the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) website. The first is a spare rape allegation:
I was raped by Father Tom King when I was a freshman at the University of Notre Dame in the early 1990s.
HMFG also describes locker room incidents involving “many victims” in which he surmised Father King employed a ruse to get students to strip while he watched.
- As to the University’s actions, HMFG referred to a 2023 “investigation” by Father Peter Jarrett, who is the Victim Assistance Coordinator for the Order. And HMFG, too, asserted the university was long aware of the charges:
University has known about the abuse since at least 1996. A number of graduating Domers and their fathers went to the authorities on campus and reported King’s inappropriate behavior. Nothing public has come of it.
Notre Dame and Sexual Abuse
An examination of sexual assault incidences and University policies and procedures over the years would take us too far afield, but a few observations might be helpful.
First, the University has not been tarnished by confirmed cases of sexual abuse of minors by clergy since the national sexual abuse scandal broke in 2002.
The Order’s list of “credibly accused” priests does not include any while at Notre Dame, and we cannot find any adjudicated cases involving non-Order priests.
Of course, this doesn’t mean there has been no clerical sexual abuse. Experience teaches that victims often remain silent. And there was Rev. Samuel Peters, C.S.C., who was dismissed from his position as rector and removed from public ministry because of his “inappropriate sexual relationship with an adult woman.” The university “declined to reveal whether the woman involved is a student.”
(One of the victims described his experience in a harrowing 2003 Notre Dame Magazine article. The author deserves credit for writing it and the magazine for publishing it.)
The South Bend Tribune also reported that a group of alumni had organized to “seek detailed information about how the university handles cases of alleged clergy sexual misconduct and how many cases have been reported in the past three decades.”
Perhaps the current external review is in part a response to this initiative.
Conclusion
This is a commendable move by Father Dowd and chairman Veihmeyer. The thoroughness of this investigation and the response of the administration will be critical to maintaining the integrity of the University. The disclosure in the earlier years of the century of an epic number of cases of sexual abuse by clergy and widespread cover-ups by superiors severely damaged the Church and some of its institutions. Let us pray that the Holy Spirit guide Ms. Cantwell and her associates in their quest for truth and justice.
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Oremus
O God of Truth and Love, You have called us into a loving and faithful relationship with You. Your Son identified Himself as the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and called us to follow Him wherever He goes.
In their care for and guardianship of the University and the students it serves, may the administrators of the University of Notre Dame always commit themselves to the pursuit and embrace of the Truth, which alone can set us free.
May the Holy Spirit lead them into all truth and recall them to it in times of peril. May they embrace the sorrow that comes from being different from, and rejected by, the world, so that they may rejoice always in the goodness of the Lord.
In the day of battle, may they joyfully take courage in Him who has already overcome the world.
We make our prayer through the intercession of Notre Dame, Our Mother, and in the Name of Jesus, Your Son, who lives and reigns with You, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, forever and ever. Amen.
The above prayer is by Sycamore Trustee Father John Raphael (’89). To join us in regular prayer projects such as our Novena for Catholic Education and our Meditation on the 12-Days of Christmas, please join our Apostolate.
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There is a lot of discussion in the Catholic Church these days about needing to change how we look at things. Every weekend when Notre Dame is on NBC, we are treated to nice vignettes of how Notre Dame wants to make the world a better and frequently safer place.
We have all heard the horrible stories of previous internal investigations into misconduct, whether it be at Catholic dioceses or police departments. I call on Fr. Bob to adopt a new way of thinking about how to handle a situation like this, and in the process start a new “role model” or example for how to handle allegations of clerical sexual abuse in the United States. I speak for myself, not Sycamore Trust or anyone else.
First, any “man” that commits a crime and knowingly breaks the law will have an opportunity to defend himself, have court appointed counsel and will have an opportunity to raise money for his legal defense. What happened between that “man”, his alleged victims and the criminal law is for that man to handle on his own as he sees fit. It is NOT for his employer to rush in and shield him, or pretend to be a government law enforcement agency investigating serious serial sexual crimes, in my lay man’s opinion. It was my understanding that Pope Benedict essentially said something similar roughly 20 years ago, though I know secularists and liberals like to ignore him and what most popes said the previous 2000 years of the Church. Even though Notre Dame has it’s own zip code and signs on the interstate, Notre Dame is not a government agency and does not have veteran criminal investigators to investigate multiple serious CRIMES. Notre Dame students and alumni and their families deserve better than having the investigation of serious crimes on campus being treated as a civil legal matter to be “managed”, rather than the best criminal investigative and victim advocates work on this matter. Notre Dame is about fresh thinking and doing the best, right?
Wouldn’t it be refreshing for the Church itself to report allegations of sexual abuse within its employees and step aside and let veteran criminal investigators conduct the investigation and veteran victims advocates help the victims and just stay the hell out of the way? Fr. Bob, you weren’t in charge when these allegations originally occurred and you can’t change what happened, but you can change how the paradigm of how the Catholic Church handles this going forward. Are you going to treat this as a Clinton bimbo eruption or say that no client list exists for Jeffrey Epstein? Abraham was called by God to sacrifice his only son, who he loved more than anything else in the world, and when it came time to start the sacrifice, God saved the man and his son who followed God’s will unquestioningly. Think about that, you are a disciple of Christ who puts the truth and doing what is right above all else, right? Let God manage this situation, not a NY law firm. Sounds knaive and silly doesn’t it, but maybe if you’re only focused on money and reputation, instead of doing the right thing. In my layman’s opinion< I call on you to call Kash Patel and turn over any investigative materials Notre Dame already has.
Your provost is a history professor. Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it. I will end with an excerpt from a Wikipedia article that may be enlightening.
The Penn State child sex abuse scandal concerned allegations and subsequent convictions of child sexual abuse committed by Jerry Sandusky, an assistant coach for the Penn State Nittany Lions football team, over a period of at least fifteen years. The scandal began to emerge publicly in March 2011 and broke in early November 2011 when Sandusky was indicted on 52 counts of child molestation, stemming from incidents that occurred between 1994 and 2009.[1] Sandusky was ultimately convicted on 45 counts of child sexual abuse on June 22, 2012,[2] and was sentenced to a minimum of 30 years and a maximum of 60 years in prison.[3] Of the 10 victims who were listed, only eight appeared at trial. All were over the age of 18 by the time they testified. Six were over 21.
Additionally, three Penn State officials, school president Graham Spanier, vice president Gary Schultz, and athletic director Tim Curley, were charged with perjury, obstruction of justice, failure to report suspected child abuse, and related charges.[4] The Penn State Board of Trustees commissioned an independent investigation by former FBI Director Louis Freeh, whose report stated that Penn State's longtime head football coach Joe Paterno, along with Spanier, Curley and Schultz, had known about allegations of child abuse by Sandusky as early as 1998, had shown "total and consistent disregard…for the safety and welfare of Sandusky's child victims", and "empowered" Sandusky to continue his acts of abuse by failing to disclose them.[5]: 14 [6][7] Shortly after the scandal broke, Spanier resigned. The board of trustees terminated the contracts of Paterno and Curley.
As a result of the scandal, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) imposed sanctions on the Penn State football program: a $60 million fine, a four-year postseason ban, scholarship reductions, and a vacation of all victories from 1998 to 2011.[8] These sanctions were among the most severe ever imposed on an NCAA member school. NCAA President Mark Emmert stated that the sanctions were levied "not to be just punitive, but to make sure the university establishes an athletic culture and daily mindset in which football will never again be placed ahead of educating, nurturing and protecting young people."[9][10] The Big Ten Conference subsequently imposed an additional $13 million fine.[11]
Queers in the Catholic clergy have cost parishioners hundreds of millions $$$ in judicial awards for sexual abuse . . . leaving many dioceses bankrupt.
Thank you for posting this story. And thank you for everyone’s comments.
I am one of the Zahm Hall students who survived Father King’s abuse.
I’m happy to answer any questions. Please respect my choice to stay anonymous for now.
There is a new posting at Sycamore Trust since you last wrote. May God bless both the truth tellers and those who have the wisdom to do the right thing in this situation.
I was a Zahm resident in the late 80s. All my pals from the hall are deeply disturbed about the situation. Do you have any sense of how many survivors there are? I asked the law firm conducting the investigation but they were not prepared to share any details yet, although they promised a forthright and comprehensive report. Here’s hoping they and the school make good on that.
For Notre Dame to unashamedly proclaim the Truth and Beauty of the one true holy Catholic and Apostolic Church in the spirit of its founders, the Holy Cross Priests, and the Blessed Virgin Mother Mary, for whom the university is named. From the Truth of life beginning at conception and needing to be protected in the womb to the Truth that there are only 2 genders, and that we are created in them as men and women by our Creator, in the image and likeness of God, to the Truth that it is the content of one’s character that matters and not their identity or the color of their skin, I fervently pray that Notre Dame’s leaders, academic deans, professors, administrators, and students have the peace of mind, strength, courage, and fortitude to be beacons of light in the growing darkness of academia that cannot even recognize the scourge of anti-semitism on Ivy League campuses and is actively subverting these truths today.
Sympathy for all the students affected by this situation. It did take courage to say something, a lot of courage. I would like to see Notre Dame turn over its investigative files, whether by Fr. Jarrett or the NY law firm to the St. Joseph County prosecutor. Now that would truly by an act of honest integrity and discourage any future possible inappropriate activity towards students. Why hasn’t Notre Dame announced Fr. Jarrett’s previous investigation before now? Notre Dame in all honesty doesn’t want these allegations to be true and may fear civil liability. The NY law firm appears to work for and get paid by Notre Dame, and no one else in this matter. Wonder if the graduated students being interviewed by the NY law firm will ask the St. Joe County prosecutor and their own attorneys to also be present, when the allegations are being discussed regarding employees from a multimillion dollar organization? It might be harder for people to misunderstand what was said in an interview if multiple people, who hopefully have the truth and the students’ interest first, were present. Curious how much influence Notre Dame has over local politicians like the St. Joe County prosecutor? May God bless the truthful people who act with courage and do what is right.
Discovery of the truth is paramount. Disclosure of the reasons for involving (or not involving) law enforcement is also key. It is just plain wearisome to constantly see a claim for an “independent, third party investigation” as if such a move will put all the issues to rest – these have been attempted by dioceses in the past, only to result in the diocese requesting the investigation to stonewall the selected third party investigator.