It looks to me like the church hierarchy enabled and instructed instructed the bishops to do the covering up. It's quite possible that even some of the offending priests were not aware of that at the time.

In theory, we elect (and pay) governments and local authorities to be responsible for the supervision of the offending establishments. We pay dearly for a justice system to deal with those who slip through the net. We give up a slice of our freedom for these things.

Whilst I can appreciate, in Christian terms, why the church would pray for the perpetrators and facilitators, the view from the outside seems to be that they are merely praying for themselves and the church. It should be a strictly private thing, confined to the the mind of the individual doing the praying.