Pope Put Off Move to Punish Abusive Priest.

The priest, convicted of tying up and abusing two young boys in a California church rectory, wanted to leave the ministry. But in 1985, four years after the priest and his bishop first asked that he be defrocked, the future Pope Benedict XVI, then a top Vatican official, signed a letter saying that the case needed more time and that ''the good of the Universal Church'' had to be considered in the final decision, according to church documents released through lawsuits. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]