The issue that led to Malone’s first news conference since last November centered on a love letter from the Rev. Ryszard Biernat to a seminarian, Matthew Bojanowski, and the Rev. Jeffrey Nowak’s alleged harassment of Bojanowski.

Malone can be heard in secretly recorded audio calling the crisis over a “love triangle” involving priests a “disaster” that could force him to resign.

The audio released late Tuesday by WKBW-TV showed Malone confiding in Biernat that “this could be the end for me as bishop,” if a story surfaced in the media about the three priests.

“It sounds like a soap opera. It sounds like a love triangle. And you know what the media can do with that,” Malone is heard in the recording saying to Biernat. “With all else that’s going on in the diocese and all the … attacks on my credibility … that I’ve known that something’s going on here that shouldn’t be and I let it go … I mean this is a disaster.”

Malone Wednesday rejected any notion of being forced to resign over the latest scandal, saying “I don’t feel it’s time for me to move on," during the 45-minute news conference in the rectory of St. Joseph's Cathedral.