James McCarthy

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This article is about the bishop. For other people named James or Jim McCarthy see McCarthy (surname).

Bishop James F. McCarthy (born July 9, 1942) was an auxiliary bishop in the Archdiocese of New York, who resigned from his parish assignment during the 2002 sex scandal in the Roman Catholic Church.

His first assignment was to the Church of Saint Denis in Hopewell Junction, where his tenure lasted until 1976. That year, he was transferred to the Church of Saint Benedict in the Bronx, where he remained until the beginning of Cardinal O'Connor's term (1984). He was appointed O'Connor's secretary that year, a position he maintained for 12 years to come.

McCarthy remained at Saint Benedict's until April 1996, when he was transferred to the Church of Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton in Shrub Oak, New York. He was installed as pastor, and named a bishop by O'Connor on May 11, 1999. He concelebrated a Mass in the Vatican with Pope John Paul II later that year.

On June 12, 2002, Cardinal Edward Egan accepted McCarthy's resignation, after McCarthy admitted to "a number of affairs with women over several years." McCarthy, acknowledged this at the age 59 years old, he claimed his lover was a 21-year-old female when the affair took place 25 years prior. This woman whom he acknowledged as having had the affair with was subsequently identified as the writer of an accusatory letter to the Archdiocese concerning McCarthy's sexual behavior, despite the fact that McCarthy claimed the tryst was consensual. The woman believed it would be innapropriate for Bishop McCarthy to attend a meeting of all American Bishops in Dallas of that year, the inspriation for notifying the Archdiocese of New York in the first place. It was Cardinal Egan that took action on the information, demanding Bishop McCarthy's resignation and removal.

Cardinal Edward Egan, although denying requests to defrock McCarthy, vowed that he would no longer function as a priest within the archdiocese.