The Church and the Scandal of Sexual Abuse — Pope Emeritus Benedict

In his most significant pronouncement since he resigned the papacy in 2013, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI has written a lengthy essay on clerical sex abuse in which he explains what he sees as the roots of the crisis, the effects it has had on the priesthood, and how the Church should best respond.

[...]

The essay is divided into three parts. The first is an examination of the “wider societal context” of the crisis, in which he says he tries to show that an “egregious event” occurred in the 1960s “on a scale unprecedented in history.”

A second section deals with the effects of this on the “formation of priests and on the lives of priests.”

And in a third part he develops “some perspectives for a proper response on the part of the Church.”

National Catholic Register

I feel as if this is old news already since it is all over mainstream media, but I wanted to give a heads-up for anyone who wanted to read sources instead of sound bites.

I read the National Catholic Register summary, which is quite thorough, and it made a lot of sense to me.

You can read the whole essay at the Catholic News Agency. I've not read the actual essay yet but have printed it out.

Just glancing through it, this looks like classic, thoughtful, thorough Benedict XVI ... and it makes me realize how much I've missed his writing. With a few zingers like this one which made me laugh out loud:

What must be done? Perhaps we should create another Church for things to work out? Well, that experiment has already been undertaken and has already failed.

(Thanks to Mark for pointing that one out to me.)

Cardinal DiNardo: reaffirmed call for a prompt and thorough examination into how the grave moral failings of a brother bishop could have been tolerated for so long and proven no impediment to his advancement.

I was just wondering yesterday if we'd hear again from Cardinal DiNardo (president of the U.S. Bishop's Council) about plans for the future in reference to Cardinal McCarrick. After the first flurry of press releases, it would be easy to let things die down until the bishops' conference in a few months.

Nope. He read my mind and came out with a piece yesterday which makes me feel he is really urgent and cares about the issue, especially since he mentions Archbishop Viganò's letter. Here's a bit but do go read it all.

Yesterday, I convened our Executive Committee once again, and it reaffirmed the call for a prompt and thorough examination into how the grave moral failings of a brother bishop could have been tolerated for so long and proven no impediment to his advancement.

"The recent letter of Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò brings particular focus and urgency to this examination. The questions raised deserve answers that are conclusive and based on evidence. Without those answers, innocent men may be tainted by false accusation and the guilty may be left to repeat sins of the past.

... I am confident Pope Francis shares our desire for greater effectiveness and transparency in the matter of disciplining bishops. We renew our fraternal affection for the Holy Father in these difficult days.

ALSO, Bishop Barron has a video Q&A about the Sexual Abuse Crisis. Note: the audio has also been uploaded to the Word on Fire podcast feed.

Friends, many of you have asked for my thoughts on the McCarrick abuse crisis, the Pennsylvania grand jury report, and the recent report from Archbishop Viganò. We're all devastated by the horrific suffering of these many victims, and we're all wondering what to do next.

I shared some thoughts a couple weeks ago, in an article, but I thought it might be helpful to have a more candid conversation today, building on the USCCB's statement just released, which I wholly support.

Please watch the discussion, and together let's pray for the victims and the entire Body of Christ.

Always happy to be Catholic?

I look at my subtitle these days and find it is still true. I am still happy to be Catholic.

Some may wonder how that can be in the wake of the revelations about sexual predator Cardinal McCarrick who was an open secret among many of his brother bishops. Or in the wake of the grand jury report on Pennsylvania detailing 70 years of misconduct and systematic church coverup in six dioceses across the state. (PDF of report here.)

The Pennsylvania report which has been the subject of so much reporting is not really news. We got a lot of this bad news during the first wave of the scandals in the nineties and early aughts. The good part was that things seem to be on the mend, as the report itself mentions, in that much has improved over the last fifteen years. That is reason for hope.

For me the most illuminating part was that it went back seven decades, well beyond the common understanding of this problem arising as part of the post-Vatican II era and the sexual revolution. It made me think of Bishop Barron's reflections on the original scandal as a diabolical masterpiece because "that awful crisis just seemed too thought-through, too well-coordinated, to be simply the result of chance or wicked human choice."

My thoughts turned to Pope Leo XIII who is said to have written the St. Michael prayer in response to a vision he had of Satan being allowed to test the Church and choosing the 20th century. The visible threats to the Church during that time from changing governments and social values and other sources suddenly seemed like only one front in a global war. We fought the threats we could see while under the surface innocent people were victims of an evil we couldn't imagine. An evil perpetrated by a fifth column* of trusted priests and bishops.

For that reason I welcome the report. It sheds light into the darkness. I welcome the exposure of Archbishop McCarrick and those who joined his evil by their silence. If we do not see the source of an infection, the existence of a cancer, how can we eradicate it? Now we know the hard truth. Now we can work through the shock and horror of new knowledge. Now we can begin the long work of healing and rebuilding for the victims, for the Church, and, yes, even for the hated perpetrators and collaborators, many of whom are still in denial.

I know many are so angry and hurt and upset that they are talking of leaving or indeed have already left. I grieve for them but in my own case the reality of the Church is not the deeds these evil men have perpetrated in her name. They have corrupted and perverted the Truth that Christ gave us. Where could I go? There is nowhere else that has the fullness of truth. I am not happy about anything to do with this whole mess, but I am happy that the sure foundation of Christ and His Church is here for me.

As a result of this, many [of] his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him.

Jesus then said to the Twelve, “Do you also want to leave?”

Simon Peter answered him, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.”

Gospel of John 6:66-69

So how do we practice our own share of that healing and rebuilding work? Elizabeth Scalia has 7 good, practical steps we can take. They are at the bottom of her piece if you are in a hurry, though the whole thing is good. Here's the personal part for everyday:

• Help define what makes a healthy church and begin to be yourself the church you want to see by becoming an open conduit for the love, justice, and mercy of Christ, and the movement of the Holy Spirit, to come forth—even if how Christ defines justice and mercy is not quite as you would prefer; even if the Holy Spirit seems to be taking a turn you don’t understand. That openness is essential because it is a form of consent that speeds along both the action of the Spirit and the glory of God.

... commit to deepening your own prayer life. Pick up the Divine Office and pray some part of it daily. If the opportunity to pray before the Blessed Sacrament is available to you, take advantage of it. Ignore anyone who tells you that it’s an antiquated medieval piety best left behind, which is precisely the sort of stupid, arrogant thinking that helped bring us to where we are. How can praying before the very Presence of Christ be anything but good and powerful? Hint: it can’t.

Two more imperatives:

• Fast.
• Offer up your own troubles for the healing of the Church and in reparation for all of her sins. Yes, offering it up is still a thing, and it is powerful.

I add to the above that we need to keep our priests and bishops in our prayers. The vast majority of priests are good men who are also in shock over the latest revelations, trying to shepherd their flocks through this flood of troubles. Likewise, not every bishop was part of the uncaring, collaborative hierarchy.

*A group within a country at war who are sympathetic to or working for its enemies.

In the Midst of Clerical Misdeeds, a Crucial Moment for the Laity

Just when I think I've shared the last piece I need to about this McCarrick scandal, another comes up. This one from Msgr. Charles Pope, urges us to write a physical letter to our bishop so they really understand this is a scandal that will not go away.

Here's a bit of it:

I am not sure how many of the bishops realize just how angry, disheartened and disturbed God’s people really are. ...

I have never seen people so serious and determined to take actions of their own....

As a Church hierarchy, we have worn on folks’ last nerve. We have come to a point where only penance and a complete housecleaning can restore credibility and trust. As a lower-ranking priest I cannot issue demands or send binding norms to those in wider and upper ranks of the hierarchy, but I do want to say to God’s faithful how powerfully aware I am of their justified anger and agree with their insistence that something more than symbolic action or promises of future reform is necessary.

I also would like to say to God’s faithful that this is a critical hour for you. I have learned from Church history that reform almost never comes from the top; it comes from religious life and from the grass roots, from among God’s people. ...

Read it all here.

Bishop Barron on The McCarrick Mess

While I have been disillusioned and saddened by the silence of  bishops and cardinals I really admired, one bishop's silence especially had me on tenterhooks. I admire Bishop Robert Barron and his Word on Fire ministry so much that to see time go by with no commentary was really worrying.

I told myself that he is an auxiliary bishop and probably had to wait until his own bishop gave permission. If that was not the reason ... well, I knew it would be a heartbreaking admission of how far the entire hierarchy had fallen. So you can imagine how happy I was to see this piece. Here's a bit but go read it all for yourself.

Now I can hear people saying, “So Bishop Barron is blaming it all on the devil.” Not at all. The devil works through temptation, suggestion, and insinuation—and he accomplishes nothing without our cooperation. If you want to see the principle illustrated, Google Luca Signorelli’s image of the Antichrist in the Orvieto Cathedral. You’ll see what I mean. Archbishop McCarrick did wicked things and so did those, it appears, who enabled him. And we have to come to terms with these sins.

Laity are "Essential," Must Lead Any Investigation

In reference to former Cardinal McCarrick and his abuses which apparently were an open secret among his fellow bishops, Cardinal Weurl proposed having a national panel of bishops investigate complaints against bishops. Talk about tone deaf.

Jeff Miller at The Curt Jester does a nice summing up of where we are at this moment. And I give all tribute to Bishop Scharfenberger who does understand the problem and what must happen for reform. It is the way I myself feel. As Jeff says, "May his tribe increase."

Statement by Bishop Edward B. Scharfenberger
of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany

August 6, 2018

While I am heartened by my brother bishops proposing ways for our Church to take action in light of recent revelations – and I agree that a national panel should be commissioned, duly approved by the Holy See – I think we have reached a point where bishops alone investigating bishops is not the answer. To have credibility, a panel would have to be separated from any source of power whose trustworthiness might potentially be compromised.

It is time for us, I believe, to call forth the talents and charisms of our lay faithful, by virtue of their baptismal priesthood. Our lay people are not only willing to take on this much-needed role, but they are eager to help us make lasting reforms that will restore a level of trust that has been shattered yet again. In speaking with them, we all hear their passion for our universal Church, their devotion to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and their hunger for the truth. They are essential to the solution we seek.

What is needed now is an independent commission led by well-respected, faithful lay leaders who are beyond reproach, people whose role on such a panel will not serve to benefit them financially, politically, or personally. These will be people with a deep understanding of the Catholic faith, but without an axe to grind or an agenda to push. It will not be easy, but it will be worth every ounce of effort, energy, and candor we can muster.

We bishops want to rise to this challenge, which may well be our last opportunity considering all that has happened. We must get this right. I am confident we can find a way to look outside ourselves, to put this in the hands of the Holy Spirit, and to entrust our very capable lay people, who have stood with us through very difficult times, to help us do the right thing. We need an investigation — the scope of which is not yet defined but must be defined — and it must be timely, transparent and credible.

Extra tidbit: I've been in a couple of recent conversations about this with other faithful, distressed Catholics and Simcha Fisher echoes many of our conclusions about how this state of affairs happened.

McCarrick and the Deafening Silence

Former Cardinal McCarrick forced his attentions on seminarians for years. Though complaints were made as long as two decades ago, they were turned away until recently when it was admitted that the evidence was credible. I explain this because if I hadn't mentioned it to my husband he'd never have heard about it. He doesn't seek out Catholic news and the newspaper and TV news we frequent hadn't mentioned it.

First I was horrified and furious that the complaints were shoved under the carpet even after we'd been assured the sex scandals were a thing of the past, that victims were being heard, that new policies were in place to prevent reoccurrence — even as one of the biggest movers and shakers (McCarrick) was an offender whose sins were apparently an open secret among his fellow bishops. And that is the most horrifying of all. Some of the bishops who'd received information are those who I respect and trust the most. And their silence has been deafening. Those whited sepulchers.

I've had nothing to say on the topic that others haven't but these are pieces that say particularly well what is in my heart.

If an excerpt catches your eye, be sure to go read the whole piece (links are in the subheads). There's no way I can really capture them with these snippets.

DarwinCatholic: A Moral Crisis
A good summing up, well reasoned, calm and to the point.

Any leader in the church, lay or clerical, who thinks that it is in any way advantageous to the church to keep quiet and allow a bishop to cover up a life of grave sin is a leader that we do not need.

We are all sinners, some may say. Who are we to judge? How can we say that we won't tolerate a sinner as a bishop?

All bishops are sinners. All of us are sinners. But if someone is to be a leader in the church, he should be prepared to admit his sins, repent of them, and resolve not to commit them again.

Elizabeth Scalia: How to Restore a Church in Scandal? Begin With a Collective Confession.
Scalia has already been pointing out that it is now the laity's work to insist on our bishops doing the right thing and holding leadership to a real accounting. She continues with thoughts on just how that works.

Making an address to the Supreme Convention of the Knights of Columbus in June of 1972, Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen said something most relevant to our times:

Who is going to save our Church? Not our bishops, not our priests and religious. It is up to you, the people. You have the minds, the eyes, and the ears to save the Church. Your mission is to see that your priests act like priests, your bishops act like bishops, and your religious act like religious.

[...]

There is a great deal of work to be done, and as I have written elsewhere, the laity must necessarily be part of that work. As we discern how to proceed, we can immediately do two things:

• Pray for our priests, by name when we can, every day and at every Mass.
• Do penance for the sins of our Church, and be willing to suffer a bit for the sake of its restoration to spiritual health.

Ross Douthat: The Truth About Cardinal McCarrick

One of the best things that the bishops of the American Catholic Church did during the great wave of sex abuse revelations 16 years ago — and yes, there’s a low bar for “best” — was to establish a National Review Board, staffed by prominent layman, with the authority to commission an independent report on what exactly had happened in the church.

The result was a careful analysis by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice that detailed the patterns of priestly sex abuse in American Catholicism between 1950 and 2002 ...

Now, unfortunately, it needs to happen again. But what needs to be commissioned this time, by Pope Francis himself if the American bishops can’t or won’t, isn’t a synthetic overview of a systemic problem. Rather, the church needs an inquest, a special prosecutor — you can even call it an inquisition if you want — into the very specific question of who knew what and when about the crimes of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, and why exactly they were silent.

Get Religion: Why didn't journalists investigate McCarrick earlier? Because they thought conservatives were out to get him
It turns out that bishops aren't the only ones keeping silent. Journalists saw plenty of smoke, but ignored the fire.

Certain reporters could not lay aside their biases against church conservatives to investigate whether there was a fire behind all the smoke.

Journalism rule #1: Never, never assume that someone is crying wolf.

Journalism rule #2: Never assume the folks – whose viewpoints you disagree with – have nothing of value to say.

I agree a lot of bishops are to blame for not bringing this mess to light a lot earlier. But so are the journalists who heard about this years ago and chose to do nothing.