NEW ORLEANS (AP) An attorney for New Orleans' Roman Catholic archdiocese Thursday strongly defended the New Orleans Saints' behind-the-scenes help in dealing with the clergy sex abuse crisis, saying the legal effort to release hundreds of confidential emails between them is aimed at trying to shame those “who had the audacity” to back the church.

Claims that the NFL team's public relations help was improper are "nothing more than a clear attack on the Catholic faith and the Catholic Church for wrongs of the past that the church has acknowledged,” attorney E. Dirk Wegmann argued.

He added that the emails are private and “should not be parsed through simply for the purpose of annoying or embarrassing - or bringing public scrutiny on - individuals who supported the church.”