|
Reflections
on the Sexual Abuse Crisis
in the Catholic Church
The entire Catholic community is
affected in one way or another by the sex abuse of minors by
church ministers. Although the effect of the crisis on the
general Catholic population pales in comparison to the
devastating personal impact felt by the victims and their
families, all of us struggle to make sense out of this tragedy
and crime. We offer these reflections to help
Catholics, particularly those who are not immediately or
personally involved, address the wide range of emotions and
reactions which the abuse scandal evokes.
The
opinions and facts expressed in these reflections do not
necessarily reflect the opinions of, or
constitute an admission
of fact by, the pastors or staff members of the Catholic
parishes in Waterloo or the Archdiocese of Dubuque.
____________________________________
“Out
of the darkest hour comes
the brightest light”
Msgr. Lyle
Wilgenbush
Episcopal Vicar/Archdiocese of
Dubuque
I have here the Easter homily I
prepared earlier this week. But as the news of the week
continued regarding sex abuse in our Church and particularly
‘what our Pope knew and when he knew it’, I made the decision to
prepare something different. The news is simply in our face and
it isn’t going to go away. Nor should it! This Easter Sunday we
find ourselves with conflicting news: the news of the day about
sexual abuse and honesty about the crisis, and then the news of
Jesus’ resurrection. I hope no one ever told you that following
Jesus and being a Christian in the modern age would be easy!
I was led to make this change
especially after reading to news articles on Good Friday
evening: one was Fr. Ron Rolheiser’s column in Easter edition of
The Witness and an article from the Washington Post
that appeared in Friday’s Waterloo Courier.
The Courier
article referred to Msgr. John Enzler’s reflection on how to
approach his own Easter homily in a Washington D.C. parish in
light of all the media on the current crisis and the involvement
or lack of involvement of Benedict XVI. He says, “Do you slip it
into the Good Friday bulletin? Or meet it head-on with an Easter
sermon?” …. “The thing is, this is not exactly what people
expect on Easter, … yet not to address it could alienate those
on the fence …those with doubts, who want answers, honesty and
transparency from the church. To say nothing leaves the question
hanging in the air, and opening to be filled by critics and
negative stories in the news media.” I heard his reflections as
a challenge to toss my original homily and go to work again on a
different one.
Fr. Ron Rolheiser’s column in
The
Witness confirmed my decision to do exactly that. His Easter
column is how crucifixion was clearly meant to be humiliating.
Most all of us have had some sense of how terrible death by
crucifixion was. The film “The Passion of the Christ” of a few
years ago no doubt strengthened our sense of that. But over the
last year’s I personally have learned some things that I never
did realize, that for one reason or another no one ever taught
me about crucifixion. Those who were crucified under the Romans
were crucified naked. The Romans did everything they could to
humiliate their criminals. Crucifixion was designed to maximize
the physical pain; they made sure the procedure was dragged out
over a good number of hours. They even calculated the amount of
pain inflicted at any one time so as not to cause the criminal
to fall into unconsciousness and thus ease their pain.
And when it was time to actually
mount them on the crosses, they stripped them naked, with
genitals publicly exposed, for the greatest possible human
humiliation. As well, when death came the bowels of the criminal
would loosen. That is how our Jesus ended his life; exposed in
every way possible. Rolheiser says:
“We have tended to
downplay this aspect, both in our preaching and in our art. We have surrounded the
cross with roses, with aesthetic and antiseptic wrapping towels. But that was not the
case for Jesus. His nakedness was exposed, his body publicly humiliated. That, among
other reasons, is why the crucifixion was such a devastating blow to his disciples
and why many of them abandoned Jesus and scattered after the crucifixion. They simply
couldn’t connect this kind of humiliation with glory, divinity, and triumph”
Rolheiser spends the rest of his
column showing how it is in times of greatest humiliation,
however, that we come to real and true depth of soul.
…incidences that have made us feel
some shame in acknowledging them
…powerlessness from which we could
not protect ourselves
…abuses from which we could not
defend ourselves
…inadequacies of body or mind that
left us vulnerable
…humiliating incidents that have
happened to us
If we have any depth of soul to our
person, Rolheiser says, it has been born to large extent and
probably entirely from such experiences of humiliation. Our only
cause for concern is that through such humiliating times we grow
deeper in compassion, graciousness, and forgiveness, and not
deeper in hate, anger and revenge.
So, my sisters and brothers, it is
Easter. The humiliation of Jesus is complete: He himself said,
“Father, it is finished!” Ours, however, is not so complete.
I don’t have any answers to the
questions posed in the media. I wonder just as you do, ‘what did
he know, and when did he know it?” But, my friends, that is the
question we have all carried since the sex abuse scandal broke
in our own country in 2001: what did our bishops know and when
did they know it? An even more challenging: ‘what did we know,
and when did we know it?”
Today you do know that Jesus is
risen. Today you do know that out of the darkest hour comes the
brightest light, and out of the deepest and most painful
humiliations can come the greatest depth of soul. It is ours to
walk the journey in this hope. In spite of the questions, the
anger, the pain, the confusion we live our lives. Mary and the
disciples did it then; you and I are called to do it now. As
much as you are able, dear sisters and brothers, …. Happy Easter!
Msgr. Wilgenbush is a priest of
the Archdiocese of Dubuque and Episcopal Vicar for the Waterloo
region. He preached this homily on Easter Sunday, April 4,
2010 at parishes in Lourdes and Alta Vista.
____________________________________
“What is this pain in comparison
to the pain of the victims?”
Cardinal Christoph Schönborn
Archbishop of Vienna
In this hour, preachy words are beside the point. They could be
not only uncomfortable, but even injurious. Keeping silent would
be appropriate. Not that silence which happens all too often:
the silence of covering up, of silencing another, the silence of
not being able to speak up. It would have to be the silence of
the friends of Job, who simply fell silent and sat in silence
before the suffering of their friend.
Thanks, that you have broken the silence. Thanks, that victims have
begun to trust themselves enough to speak. Oftentimes it takes a
long time to break out of the spiral of silence. Much has broken
open. There is less looking the other way. But much remains to
be done.
I confess that I often have the feeling of injustice these days.
Why is it mostly the Church which is pilloried? Isn’t there
abuse elsewhere? Is anyone looking into that? Is it being dealt
with? And then I am easily tempted to say: Well, the media just
plain don’t like the Church! Maybe there’s even a conspiracy
against the Church?
But then I feel in my heart – no, that’s not it. Even if that were
the case, the mirror which is held up to us reflects something
which makes abuse in the Church especially serious: it defiles
the holy name of God. It closes off, often for an entire
lifetime, access to the God who is with us and makes us free.
Abuse which is sexual or physically violent or both, when it is
committed by a church representative, by a priest or a professed
religious, can become a “poisoning of God.” The people who are
supposed to bring the nearness and the name of God become
destroyers of the relationship to God. It is this which makes
abuse in the Church even worse. Thus, the words of “holy anger”
which Jesus uttered are so terrifyingly serious: “To the person
who causes scandal to one of these little ones, it would be
better for him if a millstone were put around his neck and he be
thrown into the sea.”
Scandal to the “little ones,” the dependent ones, the defenseless,
children and youth: this meets God’s anger and woe....
He is not the God who looks the other
way and does not listen: “I have seen the pain of my people in
Egypt and I have heard their loud lament. I know their
suffering.” A God who looks in and listens closely, and who does
not remain unmoved by suffering.
How horrible it is when access to this God is closed off by
people of the Church. When the name of this living God is
poisoned. And then individuals must experience: your pain is
ignored, your suffering is not seen, your loud lament is not
heard!...
Is it not the tragedy of what we now experience, that a Gospel
of liberation has become the Bad News of abuse? From this the
Church must repent, all of us. As long as the Church does not
look in and listen closely, the Church will only obstruct the
liberating, redeeming God. Not only will the Church not proclaim
the Good News of liberation from the house of slavery, it will
make the slavery even worse.
This is a painful experience for the Church. But what is this
pain in comparison to the pain of the victims whom we have not
seen or listened to! When the victims now speak, then God
speaks to us, to his Church, in order to shake it up and purify
it; then, through the victims, that God speaks to us who said to
Moses: “I have diligently taken heed of you and have seen what
they have done to you.”
Christoph Schönborn made his remarks during a service of
lamentation March 31, 2010 in St. Stephen Cathedral, Vienna.
Read the full text online at:
www.kath-kirche.at/content/site/minidossiers/article/53660.html,
____________________________________
“From the beginning, Peter has
often been a wobbly rock”
Rev.
Timothy Radcliffe
Fresh revelations of sexual abuse by priests in Germany and
Italy have provoked a tide of anger and disgust. I have received
emails from people all around Europe asking how can they
possibly remain in the Church? I was even sent a form with which
to renounce my membership of the Church. Why stay?
First of all, why go? Some people feel that they can no longer
remain associated with an institution that is so corrupt and
dangerous for children. The suffering of so many children is
indeed horrific. They must be our first concern. Nothing that I
will write is intended in any way to lessen our horror at the
evil of sexual abuse. But the statistics for the US, from the
John Jay College of Criminal Justice in 2004, suggest that
Catholic clergy do not offend more than the married clergy of
other Churches. Some surveys even give a lower level of offence
for Catholic priests....
But what about the cover-up within the Church? Have not our bishops
been shockingly irresponsible in moving offenders around, not
reporting them to the police and so perpetuating the abuse? Yes,
sometimes. But the great majority of these cases go back to the
1960s and 1970s, when bishops often regarded sexual abuse as a
sin rather than also a pathological condition, and when lawyers
and psychologists often reassured them that it was safe to
reassign priests after treatment. It is unjust to project
backwards an awareness of the nature and seriousness of sexual
abuse which simply did not exist then....
But what about the Vatican? Pope Benedict has taken a strong
line in tackling this issue as prefect of the Congregation for
the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) and since becoming Pope....
It is generally imagined that the Vatican is a vast and
efficient organisation. In fact it is tiny. The CDF only employs
45 people, dealing with doctrinal and disciplinary issues for a
Church which has 1.3 billion members, 17 per cent of the world’s
population, and some 400,000 priests....
Angry and hurt Catholics feel a right to transparent government.
I agree. But we must, in justice, understand why the Vatican is
so self-protective. There were more martyrs in the twentieth
century than in all the previous centuries combined.... Many Catholics still suffer imprisonment and death for their
faith. Of course, the Vatican tends to stress confidentiality;
this has been necessary to protect the Church from people who
wish to destroy her. So it is understandable that the Vatican
reacts aggressively to demands for transparency and will read
legitimate requests for openness as a form of persecution. And
some people in the media do, without any doubt, wish to damage
the credibility of the Church....
Confidentiality is also a consequence of the Church’s insistence
on the right of everyone accused to keep their good name until
they are proved to be guilty. This is very hard for our society
to understand, whose media destroy people’s reputations without
a thought.
Why go? If it is to find a safer haven, a less corrupt Church,
then I think that you will be disappointed. I too long for more
transparent government, more open debate, but the Church’s
secrecy is understandable, and sometimes necessary. To
understand is not always to condone, but necessary if we are to
act justly.
Why stay? I must lay my cards on the table; even if the Church
were obviously worse than other Churches, I still would not go.
I am not a Catholic because our Church is the best, or even
because I like Catholicism. I do love much about my Church but
there are aspects of it which I dislike. I am not a Catholic
because of a consumer option for an ecclesiastical Waitrose
rather than Tesco, but because I believe that it embodies
something which is essential to the Christian witness to the
Resurrection, visible unity.
When Jesus died, his community fell apart. He had been betrayed,
denied, and most of his disciples fled. It was chiefly the women
who accompanied him to the end. On Easter Day, he appeared to
the disciples. This was more than the physical resuscitation of
a dead corpse.
In him God triumphed over all that destroys community: sin,
cowardice, lies, misunderstanding, suffering and death. The
Resurrection was made visible to the world in the astonishing
sight of a community reborn. These cowards and deniers were
gathered together again. They were not a reputable bunch, and
shamefaced at what they had done, but once again they were one.
The unity of the Church is a sign that all the forces that
fragment and scatter are defeated in Christ.
All Christians are one in the Body of Christ. I have deepest
respect and affection for Christians from other Churches who
nurture and inspire me. But this unity in Christ needs some
visible embodiment. Christianity is not a vague spirituality but
a religion of incarnation, in which the deepest truths take the
physical and sometimes institutional form. Historically this
unity has found its focus in Peter, the Rock in Matthew, Mark
and Luke, and the shepherd of the flock in John’s gospel.
From the beginning and throughout history, Peter has often been
a wobbly rock, a source of scandal, corrupt, and yet this is the
one – and his successors – whose task is to hold us together so
that we may witness to Christ’s defeat on Easter Day of sin’s
power to divide. And so the Church is stuck with me whatever
happens. We may be embarrassed to admit that we are Catholics,
but Jesus kept shameful company from the beginning.
Fr.
Radcliffe is a popular Catholic author, speaker and former
Master of the Dominican Order. This article appeared in the April 10, 2010
issue of the British Catholic weekly, The Tablet. Read the
full text online at:
http://www.thetablet.co.uk/article/14543
____________________________________
“We are actually all in this together
and quite outside of time”
Elizabeth Scalia
Catholic Writer
The question has come my way several times in the past week:
"How do you maintain your faith in light of news stories that
bring light to the dark places that exist within your church?"
When have darkness and light been anything but co-existent?
How do we recognize either without the other?
I remain within, and love, the Catholic Church because it is
a church that has lived and wrestled within the mystery of the
shadow lands ever since an innocent man was arrested, sentenced
and crucified, while the keeper of "the keys" denied him, and
his first priests ran away. Through 2,000 imperfect — sometimes
glorious, sometimes heinous — years, the church has contemplated
and manifested the truth that dark and light, innocence and
guilt, justice and injustice all share a kinship, one that waves
back and forth like wind-stirred wheat in a field, churning
toward something — as yet — unknowable.
The darkness within my church is real, and it
has too often gone unaddressed. The light within my
church is also real, and has too often gone unappreciated. A
small minority has sinned, gravely, against too many. Another
minority has assisted or saved the lives of millions.
But then, my country is the most generous and compassionate
nation on Earth; it is also the only country that has ever
deployed nuclear weapons of mass destruction.
My government is founded upon a singular appreciation of
personal liberty; some of those founders owned slaves.
My family was known for its neighborliness and its work
ethic; its patriarch was a serial child molester.
The child molester was also a brilliant, generous, talented
man — the only person who ever read me a bedtime story. I will
love him forever, for that, even when I wake up gasping and
afraid.
I am a woman with very generous instincts, and I try to love
everyone, but I am capable of corrosive scorn. Have I been much
sinned against? Yes. So have you. Have I sinned against others?
Oh, yes. So have you.
Like a pebble cast into a pond, our every action ripples out
toward the edges, reaching farther than we intended, touching
what we do not even know, for good and for ill. It all either
means nothing, or it means everything.
As a Catholic, I believe it means everything.
That doesn't mean I do not suffer for the sins of my church;
we people in the pews are roiling with feelings of betrayal,
shame, revulsion.
Having survived sexual abuse in the family and the public
schools, I identify deeply with the pain, the sense of
powerlessness and abandonment that the victims of some of our
priests and administers have endured. I grieve for them — and
for my church, and for my pope, and for all of the countless
good priests and religious who are tarnished by the actions of a
depraved minority.
I am saddened beyond words to know that these very real sins
of commission and omission will repel people, who will miss the
consolations of the church in light, out of concern for its
shadows.
But the painful and incomplete news stories that have
dominated this Holy Week helpfully illustrate how and why I am
able to continue on in faith. Particularly during the Easter
Triduum, we are thrust deeply into the crucifixion narrative of
the Gospels. There, on the wood of the cross, we encounter
Jesus, son of Mary, who knew shame, betrayal, abandonment,
scorn, jeering, ridicule, unimaginable pain and sorrow, and
submitted to them, in order to draw us into a consoling embrace
that says, "I know what you are feeling; I know what you are
thinking. You tortured ones, you shamed ones, you innocent ones,
you slandered ones; I am the One who knows, and we are actually
all in this together, and quite outside of time."
I want my church to shine. But I understand that everything,
from our institutions to our innermost beings, are seen through
a glass, darkly. Arms outstretched, listening for the Word, and
its echoing liturgy, I make my way forward, in bright hope.
Elizabeth Scalia is a contributing writer to First Things
magazine
and the blogger known as The Anchoress. This article
appeared April 2, 2010 online at:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125493179
____________________________________
“We do not face these problems
and crises alone”
Fr. Jack Wintz, O.F.M.
Columnist and former editor of St. Anthony
Messenger Press.
Like
many of you, my heart is heavy whenever I read,
see or hear media reports and commentaries about
clergy sexual abuse and the Catholic Church.
Although I don’t feel qualified to comment in an
expert way on this complicated issue, I do want
to respond to the concerns, frustration and even
anger that many of you have expressed….
As others have pointed out, the greatest
scandal on the part of the Church is our failure
to put the child victims and their families
first. In some dioceses, unfortunately,
Church leaders have made the cover-up of these
scandals and the offending priests their most
important priority. How did we get our
priorities reversed in this way?
Into our Catholic hierarchical system, at
least in some instances, has seeped the tendency
and practice of covering up faults. The system
seems to give those higher up such importance,
dignity and sacredness that their reputation
must be protected at all costs. Even those at
the bottom often “buy into” this layered
arrangement that tends to give special privilege
to those on top. If we look at the Gospels,
however, we notice that this was not the mindset
of Jesus. He often called those in leadership to
task for giving scandal or laying oppressive
burdens on those in their charge. He told those
in leadership to be servants of the others….
One consequence of the clergy sex-abuse
scandal is that the faulty priorities of the
hierarchical system have now been unmasked for
the whole world to see, and changes will have to
be made. Structures of privilege, secrecy and
protection from blame seem to be unraveling
before our eyes.
Meanwhile, the Church majority, made up of
laymen and laywomen and their children, are
beginning to see their rights and dignity
properly recognized. They are more and more
seeing themselves not simply as servants of the
higher-ups whose only role in the Church is to
pray, pay and obey. Now they are more fully
aware that their voices deserve to be heard and
respected as they claim their rightful place in
the Church envisioned by Vatican II….
Despite our failures as a Church regarding
the tragic sexual abuse of children, it’s
helpful to examine the issue from a wider
perspective. Clergy sexual abuse is an issue
that extends well beyond the Roman Catholic
Church and contains more complexities than meet
the eye….
Even an institution as simple as the family
tends to be self-protecting and secretive
regarding abusive behavior within it own ranks.
I think it is generally agreed that most cases
of sexual abuse of children happens within the
family. The perpetrators often are older family
members, relatives, family friends,
babysitters. The first instinct is often for
the family leaders to keep sexual abuse from
going public. We know, of course, that such
cover-ups are not right, especially if the
victims remain at risk. Yet we all recognize the
temptation most people have to cover up mistakes
and sins of which they are ashamed.
This is all the more true as we explore
more complex institutions—athletic or youth
associations (e.g., teams or scouts),
educational institutions, police departments,
the military, religious institutions of all
kinds, political parties, medical associations,
psychological associations, big companies like
Enron, even news networks and TV conglomerates.
Most institutions and power structures try to
protect their reputations and keep their secret
sins hidden. Again this is not right. Those
victimized by such organizations should be
protected and the offenders reported and brought
to justice. One wonders at times, however, why
the media and other groups sometimes go after
certain offenders and systems with more fervor
and fury than they go after others….
Another observation I heard or read within
the last two weeks, which brought me a bit of
light regarding the tendency on the part of
Church leaders to give priest offenders a second
chance, is that the Gospel of Jesus teaches us
to be forgiving. It is not surprising that those
who have not digested the truth about pedophilia
being an incurable disorder and who have been
trained to be forgiving could err on the side of
being too lenient with sex offenders—a deadly
mistake that hopefully is being quickly
corrected in the wake of the current scandals.
A final note for us during this Easter season:
We do not face these problems and crises alone.
The Risen Jesus, who has triumphed over sin and
death, breathes the Spirit of forgiveness and
healing upon us and walks with us toward
Pentecost.
Fr. Wintz’s remarks appeared in his
online newsletter, “Friar Jack’s
E-Inspirations,”
on April 8, 2002. You can read
the full text of his comments at:
www.americancatholic.org/e-News/FriarJack/fj040802.asp
____________________________________
“This is a dark night of the soul
meant to stretch the heart”
Fr. Ronald Rolheiser, OMI
Syndicated Columnist
…As
Christians we’re asked to carry this scandal biblically. What
does that mean? Carrying something biblically means a number of
interpenetrating things:
1. Name the moment. Not everything can be fixed or cured, but it needs to be named
properly…. This scandal, this particular time in our history as
a Catholic Church in America, is a moment of humiliation, a
moment of humbling, a moment of pruning. We must begin the
process of healing by clearly, and with courage, naming that….
2. The call to
compassion. …To carry
something biblically means, first of all, to re-ground ourselves
in the non-negotiables of Christian compassion – respect,
tolerance, patience and graciousness…. It’s easy to be
selective in our sympathy, offering our compassion at those
places where we feel good and clean when we give it and
withholding it from those people and places where we don’t get a
good, clean feeling when we offer it….
3. Healing, not
self-protection and security.
…[H]ealing, not self-protection and security, must be our real
preoccupation….To protect the innocent and to bring about
healing and reconciliation. Everything else (worries about
security, lawsuits, and the like) must come afterwards. Part of
this is how we must understand the role of the media and press
in all of this…. They are not the problem….Granted that
sometimes their coverage hasn’t been fair, but that’s ultimately
not the issue. Beneath it all, the substance is true.
4. Carrying this
crisis is not our primary ministry and not a distraction to our
ministry. Carrying
this scandal properly is something that the church is invited to
do right now for the sake of the culture….There are very few
things that we are doing as Christian communities today that are
more important than helping the world deal with this issue….
Crucifixions are never easy and they exact real blood! It might
well be worth it in the long run if we can help our world come
to grips with this.
5. Painful
humiliation as a grace-opportunity.
Purification and pruning,
humiliation leading to humility…. Today the Body of Christ is
not just being humbled, it’s being humiliated and we have the
chance to come to humility through that. This is an important
grace-opportunity for all of us inside the church. Biblically,
it’s our “Agony in the Garden.”
6. To carry this
scandal biblically asks of us “a new song.”
[What is] being asked of us in this scandal [is
this]: Can we love, forgive, reach out, and be empathic in a new
way? Can we have compassion for both the victim and the
perpetrator? Can we have compassion for some of our church
leaders who made some blunders? Can we give our money when
it seems we are paying for someone else’s sin? Can we help
carry one of the darker sides of our history without protesting
its unfairness and distancing ourselves from it? Can we
carry a tension that’s unfair to us for the sake of a greater
good?...
7. We need to
“ponder” as Mary did.
…To ponder in the biblical sense
means to hold, to carry, and transform tension so as not to give
it back in kind…. To ponder biblically is to be like a water
purifier; it takes in all kinds of impurities with the water,
but it holds the impurities inside of itself and gives back only
the pure water. That is what Mary did under the cross…. And
that is what we are called upon to do…and that is what we are
called upon to do in helping to carry this scandal biblically,
namely, to hold, carry and transform this tension so as not to
give back in kind – hurt for hurt, bitterness for bitterness,
accusation for accusation, anger for anger, blame for blame.
8. We must reaffirm
our faith in God as Lord.
…Our prayer in times of crisis
must be a prayer that precisely affirms that God is still Lord
of this world…. We need, in the midst of this crisis, to affirm
our faith in the lordship of God. God is still firmly in
charge…. The church isn’t dying. Crucifixions don’t end life,
they lead to new, enriched life.
9. We must
patiently stay with the pain.
This is a dark night of the soul which is meant,
like every dark night of the soul, to stretch the heart.
To be stretched is always painful and our normal impulse is
always to do something to end the pain…. But the pain
won’t go away until we learn the lesson that it’s meant to teach
us…. And what is it meant to teach us, beyond a new
humility? That there is a terrible pain within the culture
right now, the soul-devastation caused by sexual abuse, and we,
the church, are being asked to be like Christ, namely, to have
our flesh be food for the life of the world so that this wound
might be opened to healing.
Fr. Rolheiser is a popular
Catholic author, columnist, and president of the Oblate School
of Theology in San Antonio, Texas. Read the
complete text of Fr. Rolheiser’s essay online at:
www.ronrolheiser.com/pdfs/scandal.pdf
____________________________________
“A call to
exercise power in
a whole new way”
Fr. Michael Ryan
Rector of St. James Cathedral, Seattle
The preacher's challenge is to read the Scriptures not only as
narratives of the past but as living commentaries on the
present.... I think of this every time I prepare a homily but I thought of it
more than ever this week as I reflected on the reading from Acts
[Acts 5:27-32, 40b-41] and on the gospel story from John [John
21:1-19 or 21:1-14]. Both are stories of past events but both
speak to this moment, too.
In the reading from Acts, we saw the
apostles on trial before the Sanhedrin, a body that, for the
Jewish people, was like the Supreme Court. After being
questioned by the High Priest, the apostles were reminded that
earlier they had been strictly forbidden to teach about Jesus.
Peter responded, speaking for all of them in a way that must
have shocked and started the anointed leaders: "We must obey God
rather than men," he said!...
Peter's bold challenge to the Sanhedrin may lose some of its punch
for us. We're on Peter's side, after all. We know his importance
and can rather easily dismiss the importance of the court of the
Sanhedrin. But when Peter stood before them, those men were the
ultimate arbiter, the supreme religious authority and Peter
dared to stand them down!
It's hard for me not to read all this in light of what is currently
happening in our church, and to express the hope that, during
this current, painful crisis, our church leaders will hear
Peter's words as a challenge to humbly acknowledge that, despite
their intentions, instead of speaking for God they have
sometimes spoken -- and acted -- all too humanly.
It's hard to be deaf to the growing number of voices (not just from
the media but from loyal, faithful members of the church,
including some bishops) that are calling for the church to turn
this dreadful moment into a graced moment -- a moment of
self-examination on a whole array of things: on the way it
understands and carries out its sacred mission, the way it
exercises power, the way it chooses leaders and holds them to
account. These same voices also call for greater transparency in
the church; for a greater voice in church governance and
decision-making for lay people, including women; and for a
greater willingness on the part of church leadership to admit
mistakes where they've been made and humbly beg forgiveness.
These are voices we should heed….
These thoughts and concerns prompted by today's first reading from
Acts connect quite naturally for me with today's gospel passage
from John…. "Do you love me?" Jesus asks Peter, not one time
but three, and each time Peter assures him that he does. But
words are not enough. "Feed my lambs," Jesus tells him. "Feed my
sheep...."
Honesty compels us to admit that the church has too often put its
own perceived interests ahead of the clear and uncompromising
command of Jesus to feed, care for, and nourish his flock. At
times it has allowed selfish institutional issues and concerns
to eclipse the most basic rights of the flock, especially of
some of the weakest, most vulnerable members of the flock. This
must never happen again.
And, yes, some of the media attacks have been unfair and unbalanced
and, yes, the issues we are dealing with are by no means
exclusively the church's issues (they are societal issues), and,
yes, the moral quicksand of our secular culture deserves some of
the blame, but no amount of spreading or sharing the blame can
take away the blame that rests squarely with the church.
After he put his questions to Peter, Jesus told him what the future
would hold.... And then he repeated for Peter the first words
he ever spoke to him, words that would now mean a good deal more
to Peter than they did the first time: "Follow me."
My friends in Christ, I believe that these are words Jesus speaks
to the church now -- - all of us in the church, but especially
those of us in leadership. I hear them as a call to conversion
-- deep conversion, a call to exercise power in a whole new way,
a call to lead in the humble, strong, yet gentle way of Jesus
and to let go of the need to dominate and to control. With
Peter, the church needs to let Jesus take us places we'd
probably rather not go.
"Do you love me? Feed my lambs, feed my sheep… Follow me!" My
friends, Peter's call is now the church's call. And why should
the church -- the whole church, leaders and led -- expect better
or easier treatment than Peter got? Why should the church, the
whole church, not be willing to let go and follow in Peter's
footsteps, confident that, while God may indeed take us to
places we'd sooner not go, those places will, in the end be the
very places we're supposed to go?
Fr.
Ryan preached this homily on the Third Sunday in Easter, April
18, 2010, in St. James Cathedral in Seattle. The full text of
the homily is available online at:
http://ncronline.org/blogs/examining-crisis/turn-dreadful-moment-graced-moment
____________________________________
“Focused on the
fundamentals,
not the weaknesses and sins”
Frank Wessling
Columnist and former editor
At least one group of Catholics is not thinking about the sex
abuse scandal affecting the church with new vigor lately. The
newly baptized and the thousands of candidates received into the
church at Easter through the Rite of Christian Initiation of
Adults (RCIA) have been focused on fundamentals of our faith,
not the weakness and sins of its human caretakers.
For the most part, these Catholics are protected from scandal by
their excitement over a new sense of wholeness in their lives;
by gratitude for places in a community rich with possibilities
for all of their best and deepest desires.
They are fresh from an experience with Jesus teaching them to
wash the feet of fellow travelers, and by serving the needs of
others to carry out the love that identifies them as friends of
God.
They may still feel the deep newness of life, the healing, the
fresh start gained through the sacrament of reconciliation.
They feel themselves as true church, part of the gathered body
of Christ, which expresses humanity rising as it looks for the
way of love, the way of God, in every experience, good and bad.
They are this way because the priest they know best is Jesus,
not the poor ordained men who couldn't control a sick impulse.
They are like those first Christians described in the Acts of
the Apostles, living as beacons of light for everyone around.
The rest of us can take lessons from them.
The new revelations of clergy sexually abusing children in
Europe haven't added anything to what we already knew about this
problem. It's a rerun of the story that surfaced in this country
more than 30 years ago and exploded in the past decade: A few
priests in many places over decades or more sexually abused
thousands of children, most of them boys in early adolescence.
Bishops, concerned about scandal, kept such incidents quiet and,
taking advice from psychologists, sent the priests to places
where a cure was expected and then frequently reassigned them to
ministry.
Everyone now knows what a tragic mistake that was.
If there is a way to summarize the problem for the church, it
might be in the phrase clerical culture. In any organization, a
cocoon of self-preservation will tend to grow around the people
who manage and control it. The leaders and officers see
themselves as the people who guarantee cohesion and continuity
in the enterprise, and thus they have a right to special
privilege that goes along with their special responsibility. It
happens in business, in the military, in clubs of all kinds, and
it happens with clergy in the church.
Every priest and bishop knows very well the instruction by Jesus
to be servants rather than lords. But none of them, none of us,
knows how to perfectly carry out that instruction despite the
greatest desire to do so. It seems to be part of our pilgrimage
in history to work out solutions as we go, responding to crises
with renewed attention to the humble way of Jesus and trying to
learn from our latest mistakes.
As we do that again this time, the attitude of those new
Catholics is a useful guide. Focus on the fundamentals of our
faith, on the Gospel, on the kingdom preached by Jesus, not so
much on command and control. A table of organization and manual
of operation is necessary because we are human, but it is not
primary. Attention to the way of Jesus is.
Frank
Wessling is former editor of the
Davenport (Iowa) Catholic
Messenger.
This column was published in the April 23, 2010
Messenger
and distributed by Catholic News Service.
____________________________________
“Don’t
be afraid. Don’t give up. You will know who I am.”
Fr. Bob VerEecle SK
Pastor, St. Ignatius Parish, Boston
...In the past weeks, I’m sure you have heard, as I have, “I’ve had
enough,” from many within our Catholic community. With all the
revelations of abuse and questions of the culpability of those
religious leaders who did not address the problem in an open,
transparent and timely fashion, the wounds of so many that may
have begun to heal after 10 years in the Archdiocese of Boston,
have been opened up again with similar strains of anger,
disillusionment, even disgust, and many are saying, “I’ve had
enough.”
Even if
the Church is now trying to address more openly the
terrible reality of abuse by its clergy, the stories that
continue to emerge about the global dimensions of the problem
and especially the pattern of denial and secrecy on the part of
the hierarchy challenge all of us to ask how we continue to find
light and peace and hope in the face of darkness, distrust and
disgrace.
Like Thomas, some of us, including
myself, may be saying, “I want to believe that in Christ all
things are made new. I want to surrender to the gift of peace,
joy and love, but look at the woundedness of our Church that
continues to be torn apart by scandal and distrust, look at the
wounds of our world that continues to be torn apart by
unimaginable violence. I’ve had enough! Haven’t you, my Lord and
my God?”
I imagine those first disciples after the Crucifixion saying to
themselves, “I’ve had enough.” Enough heartbreak,
disillusionment. If we look at today’s Gospel with the disciples
back in the upper room after the events of the Crucifixion, we
may see ourselves reflected in their doubts, their fears, their
disillusionment, their hopelessness.
I have always wondered why they found themselves back in that
upper room after they had deserted and denied Jesus, had fled
for their lives, hiding from the brutal reality that Jesus, who
had been their hope, was no more. All their dreams had been
shattered. But something draws them to a place where they had
experienced life, love, community, a vision of God’s kingdom
where peace, healing, forgiveness was at the center of all.
That’s what Jesus had proclaimed and lived, had preached and
shown in his actions, had given life to in bread and wine,
blessed and broken. Those memories of what had been, the bonds
of friendship and community that had been there for them must
have been what drew them back. I can imagine each one coming
under cover of darkness, not wanting to be recognized as one of
his disciples, making their way back to the upper room and
finding each other there. Saying, “Oh, you’re here. You came
back too. But what do we do now?”
The Gospel tells us it is in the midst of this fear,
apprehension about the future, confusion and perhaps despair,
that Jesus appears. Unexpectedly speaking, “Peace! Do not be
afraid!” His presence and his peace is experienced as a reality
that constitutes a new beginning for these men and women who had
lost hope in the loss of their beloved friend, Rabboni. For
those gathered in the upper room that Easter Sunday, there is no
doubt that God has completed the work of creation begun in the
story of Genesis. God is refashioning the story of death and
disintegration. God is weaving a new tapestry of life, peace,
hope, and love. God in Jesus is saying, I can never give you
enough of my love, my peace, my life.
But like Thomas — who was not with the other broken-hearted,
fearful disciples — some of us, including myself, may be saying,
“I want to believe that in Christ all things are made new. I
want to surrender to the gift of peace, joy and love, but look
at the woundedness of our Church that continues to be torn apart
by scandal and distrust, look at the wounds of our world that
continues to be torn apart by unimaginable violence. I’ve had
enough! Haven’t you, my Lord and my God?”
And like Thomas we hear the words, “See my wounds. Place your
fingers in my side. Touch me and see that I carry in my Risen
body, not just my wounds, but yours as well, my beloved world,
and especially the community of my beloved disciples. Don’t be
afraid. Don’t give up. You will know who I am. You will know
that I have loved you. You will know who I am.”
Fr. Bob VerEecke SJ is pastor of
St. Ignatius Church in Chestnut Hill at Boston College. This
reflection was adapted from his homily on April 21, 2010 and
published online by BustedHalo.com. The complete text is
available at:
http://www.bustedhalo.com/features/had-enough/
____________________________________
“A
lost world asking that the bearers of the Truth deliver on the
Hope”
John W. Martens
Associate Professor, St. Thomas University
There is an
important article by Joseph
Bottum at The Weekly Standard.com on the recent “odd
hysteria,” that is, the media’s response and role in the recent
and revived claims regarding sexual abuse by priests and
cover-ups of this abuse by some in the Church’s leadership. That Bottum calls it an “odd hysteria” does not mean that he
considers claims about sexual abuse in the Church to be
concocted nor that he feels there have not been grave errors
made by the Church hierarchy, only, in my words, that the
Catholic Church has been made to bear far more of the weight of
the sin of sexual abuse in our culture than for which it is
responsible.
As I read Bottum,...he believes that there is a deep animus against the Catholic
Church on display in the “odd hysteria,” that has its roots in
the Protestant reformation and that was imported across the
Atlantic Ocean to the USA centuries ago. More than that, in the
wake of the Enlightenment, the claims that the Catholic Church
made and makes concerning the Truth and Tradition put it in
permanent opposition to the forces of Progress, which wished and
continue to wish for the Church’s end….
…I think he has put his finger on a deep impulse in our
culture, that remains more Christian than it knows. I say
partially insightful because I am not certain that most people
see the Catholic Church as the “last-surviving remnant of the
ancient darkness” or that recent newspaper reports reveal
"anti-Catholicism." I believe that there is in fact lurking in
all of this an inchoate longing for the Truth that the Catholic
Church proclaims. If the Church truly bears the Truth, and if we
as Christians believe it to be so, how can people, all created
in the image of God, not respond in some deep way to the bearer
of this Truth?
Our culture is confused in many ways about the very
nature of Truth and so the response to the Church, and in this
particular case the sexual abuse crisis in the Church, will take
many forms, some ridiculous and some unjust, but the reason the
Church remains at the heart of the story is that most people
expect the Church to live up to its claims to be different, to
be better, to be set apart. In fact they need the Church to be
better. I think the focus on the Church is not indicative of
people considering Catholicism as the “last-surviving remnant of
the ancient darkness,” but on the Church being the beacon of
light and the Hope of the world, even if this cannot be
expressed coherently by many of the Church’s supposed
enemies....
Related to this is the other thing that frightens
us in our culture: If nothing is true then everything is
permitted, especially in the realm of sex.... Again, this
sort of cheap hedonism is easy to chirp in cafes, nightclubs and
while sharing a joint with a friend, but there are deep concerns
regarding the turn our culture has taken with respect to sex
and, again, rightly so, if we believe that the Church’s
teachings regarding sex are true. If they are, then even when
the Church’s teachings are mocked and rejected, they ought to
speak at the deepest level even to those whose own practice of
sexuality defies the teachings of Christianity….
What I find missing from Bottum’s article and in so much of
the writing defending the Church against “anti-Catholicism” is a
long view of history and the Scriptures themselves. The desire
to explain everything in terms of the past 40, 50 or 60 years
misses the very point that Bottum was making. The biblical
tradition teaches us that history is a constant battle in which
sin and evil vie against God and the goodness which is entirely
God. Most utopian movements which emerged in the West are more
Christian than they know, as Bottum states, but they run up in
their bold visions of a new world against the reality of sin,
which most of them want to consign to the dustbin of history.
They will try to explain sin as social or economic oppression,
let’s say, and so when such oppression is gone, a new world
dawns. It is wrong.
Yet, many Catholic commentators, Bottum included, seem to
want to explain the recent scandals in the Church as a product
of Vatican II, or cultural currents present in the wider culture
since the ‘60’s, as if on the list of things the Baby Boomers
created is now sin. Read the Bible and the Church fathers: all
of these sins, sexual included, were present in the early Church
and the broader culture. This is a part of the never-ending
battle, which will end only when God makes all things new again,
as we heard in the second reading for the Fourth Sunday of
Easter, Revelation 7:15-17:
“The one who sits on the throne will shelter them.
They will not hunger or thirst anymore,
nor will the sun or any heat strike them.
For the Lamb who is in the center of the throne
will shepherd them
and lead them to springs of life-giving water,
and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
The world since Jesus’ life, death and resurrection has had
to account for him, the Truth of what he said and did and is, or
the falsity of it. It is far easier to engage in this discussion
as a dilettante when the culture is steeped in the Truth and the
behavior of most people is guided more or less by Jesus’
teaching, and you can gain a frisson of excitement by opposing
yourself to the teachings of Jesus. But when everyone wants to
be a bad boy or a bad girl, all of the sudden, the game gets
serious. How far are you willing to go? Is everything up in the
air, even your children? Now you need to seriously consider the
Truth.
For his disciples, Jesus Christ is that Truth. If the Church
does not bear witness to the Truth of Jesus Christ, that is the
scandal that shocks the world. The scandal is not “the Vatican,”
but a Church that is seen to behave like the rest of the world.
The Church has had “success” in worldly terms only to the extent
that it bears witness to the scandal of the cross by living up
to Jesus’ demands for his disciples. We need to get away from
short view discussions of Vatican II priests and JPII priests as
the cause or solution to our problems and return to the Hope to
which we bear witness in the person of Jesus Christ.
When we do, we will also see the problem with short term
analyses of sexual abuse. It is not a product of a certain age.
It was current in the
Greco-Roman culture of Jesus' day and
in fact a normal, accepted part of life. Jesus warned
against the
mistreatment of children
because he knew it would always be a temptation to take
advantage of the most vulnerable in our midst. It was a problem
in the first century, in the fourth century, every century
after, prior to Vatican II and after Vatican II, because it is a
problem of sin. What we need to put in place, as I think the
Church has done in some jurisdictions, is the best procedures
for vetting candidates to the ministry, the best protections for
children in Catholic schools and churches, the will to be honest
when such abuse happens, not to cover it up, and then to remove
offending persons from ministry. It means constantly keeping
Jesus' teachings about children in mind, not our own desires and
whims.
The “odd hysteria” that Bottum sees is not
"anti-Catholicism," but the longings of the world to know that
the Catholic Church will not give lip service to the Truth but
will live it out. It is the Hope of this world, whether the
world wants to admit it or not. I think that in the challenges
to the Church from those whom we often see as despisers, we hear
the cry of a lost world asking that the bearers of the Truth
deliver on the Hope. This side of God wiping away every tear
from our eyes it is an ongoing struggle, that began with Adam
not in the last 50 years or so, but we can fight harder and
better and deep down the world knows it.
John W. Martens is associate professor and director of the MA
program in theology at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul,
Minnesota and a contributor to America magazine's “The
Good Word." This entry was posted on the blog on
April 26, 2010 and is available online at:
http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=1&entry_id=2803
____________________________________
“A
Christian life marked by meekness,
prayer and self-sacrifice”
Editors of America Magazine
As a church we are a pilgrim people making our way
together through history. Like Chaucer’s companions on the road
to Canterbury, we have a variety of tales to tell and not all
are edifying. The latest waves of the crisis of clerical sexual
abuse of minors have made Catholics keenly aware that even in
high places we are a company of sinners as well as saints, of
fallible human beings as well as faithful followers of
Jesus—everyone in need of the forgiveness Jesus proclaimed. That
forgiveness is one of the religious experiences that binds us to
one another along our pilgrim way.
The rituals of confession and repentance remain among the most
identifiable practices of Catholic life. Their centrality to the
Catholic imagination has made the reluctance of the hierarchy to
acknowledge successive revelations of molestation all the more
painful for us all. The church’s identity as a community of
forgiven sinners makes particularly credible the demands by
victims for public confession and open reconciliation. Even the
church’s most bitter critics have been unwitting witnesses to
that Christian duty. That same Catholic sensibility made the
recent encounter between Pope Benedict and the victims of abuse
in Malta both necessary and affecting.
The church has known dark times: domination by emperors,
co-optation by feudal militarism and modern colonialism,
gangland struggles by Roman families for control of the papacy,
coercion of heretics and wars of religion. Still, we members of
the church make pilgrimage together in hope that the church may
be the visible expression in history of humanity’s new life in
Christ. To us Jesus is the embodiment of fullest humanity and
the model of its most appealing morality. Pope Benedict’s
planned visit on July 4 to the tomb of St. Celestine V, a hermit
who was elected pope and then resigned the papacy, will hold up
for view a penitent form of Christian life marked by meekness,
prayer and self-sacrifice, close to the pattern of Jesus that
Christians strive to imitate.
One reason Catholics love the church is that it fosters just
that sort of holiness. Even as the secular world exposes the
hypocrisy of church officials, it acknowledges implicitly that
the followers of Christ hold themselves to a “higher law” and
try to practice a more demanding love. Some believe that calling
is humanly impossible; others, even if they allow the Gospel
little direct claim on their own lives, are disappointed upon
failing to find holiness where they always presumed it might be
found in a moment of need. But Catholics love the church because
here we have companions who do strain, in their stumbling ways,
to lead their lives by the light of the Sermon on the Mount.
We love the church because here we keep the company of men and
women who have lived the Gospel even as they challenged both
secular and religious rulers to reform. Among them are figures
like Francis of Assisi, Catherine of Siena, Thomas More,
Ignatius Loyola, Mary McKillop, Mother Théodore Guérin, Dorothy
Day, Franz Jägerstätter and Oscar Romero. Their witness to the
Gospel brought them into conflict with the church authorities of
their day. Yet attachment to the visible, hierarchical church
was intrinsic to their own path to holiness. In an age that
experiences mostly opportunistic, transitory relationships, the
church fosters high ideals and lifelong commitments. In a
culture deprived of depth and transcendence, it encourages
searching self-examination, ever more inclusive sympathies and
attentive receptivity to the mystery of God. Some of the pain of
the present crisis comes from the apparent loss of those
practices and sensitivities when they were most needed among
those from whom they were most expected.
We love the church, too, because, as can be seen in local
parishes everywhere, it embraces the full diversity of humanity:
the affluent and the poor, the native-born and the undocumented,
conservatives and liberals, the simple and the learned. We also
love the church because in every age, but particularly since the
Second Vatican Council, it is dedicated to the service of the
poor and defense of their human rights. Even non-Catholics see
in the unselfish service of the poor the palpable holiness of
the church. Asked once how he went from being a promoter of the
free market to an advocate of the world’s poor, the economist
Jeffrey Sachs answered, “The sisters—who, in so many places,
took me to the back country to meet the very poor.”
Chief among the inexhaustible reasons that lead us to love
the church is the Eucharist. For when we gather around the table
of the Lord, the whole body of Christ in which we partake is
made real. We are united with the risen Lord for whom we live,
and with one another, not only those around the table but also
those around every altar in the world, along with those who have
preceded us in faith and those who will follow us, one great
communion prefiguring the unity of the one human family in God.
This editorial appeared in the May 10, 2010 issue of America
magazine, online at:
http://www.americamagazine.org/content/article.cfm?article_id=12279
____________________________________
“Why I remain a Catholic priest”
By Fr. Joseph Nangle OFM
...The Catholic Church is in perhaps its worst crisis ever....
This blight in our church will be with us for decades to come.
The harm done to the victims of clergy abuse, their families,
Catholics, and many others cannot be undone quickly. People have
been hurt, damaged, and disillusioned, and I believe that only
serious corrective measures, together with public
repentance—especially by Catholic ministers—over a long period
of time, will excise this malignancy.
But we will do this only if we clearly understand the gravity of
our sin and its devastating effects. I fear that as yet many
among us, including and perhaps especially our leadership, fail
to comprehend how bad this situation has become....
The preparation of candidates for the priesthood must take more
seriously the need for healthy psycho-sexual development.
Compulsive behaviors, addiction to internet pornography,
aversion to women, and stunted social skills signal that some
are not suited for the priesthood. Bishops, seminary rectors,
spiritual directors, and confessors will have to exercise “tough
love” here.
Bishops can no longer come from the ranks of “company men” who
demonstrate little or no capacity for independent thinking. (I
once heard of a prominent American hierarch state that his
conscience was exactly that of the pope. Infantile in the
extreme!)
Above all, our church must consistently act on Jesus’ words:
“The truth will make you free” (John 8:32). Only transparency,
openness, and truthfulness about past and current aspects of
this scandal, at every level of our institution, will bring the
Catholic Church out of this dark night.
National and international media have performed a much-needed
service in bringing to light the enormity of our scandal.
Perhaps some media were motivated by less-than-noble
intentions—scandals like these sell newspapers, and the Catholic
Church is an easy target. However, had it not been for dogged
investigative reporting on this issue, we might still not know
its extent.
Finally, where can Catholics find hope? Many have walked away
from this institution, and who can blame them? However, I take
hope from people by the thousands who retain the capacity to
claim the Church as their own despite the disaster that envelops
us. They are for the most part Catholic laity who, far from
denying our crisis, absorb it and lament it, while still
maintaining Christ’s peace at the core of their beings. Their
assessment of this tragedy, abiding good will, and determination
to remain Catholic inspire me to continue as a priest in our
flawed institution. I thank them sincerely.
Fr.
Joseph Nangle, OFM, is a Franciscan priest and associate pastor of Our Lady Queen of Peace parish
in Virginia. This article originally appeared in
Sojourners magazine, July 2010, and is available online at:
http://www.sojo.net/index.cfm?action=magazine.article&issue=soj1007&article=out-of-the-dark-night
____________________________________
For
Futher Reflection
Readers
may find the following articles helpful for further reflection.
The opinions and facts expressed in these articles do not
necessarily reflect the opinions of, or constitute an admission
of fact by, the pastors or staff members of the Catholic
parishes in Waterloo or the Archdiocese of Dubuque.
[Arranged
chronologically by publication date]
• Thomas J. Reese SJ.
The Unfinished Work--What Remains to Be Done. America
Website, May 11, 2012.
http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=2&entry_id=5118
• Brendan Busse SJ.
"Chosen People--On Abuse and Redemption." The Jesuit Post, May
4, 2012.
http://thejesuitpost.org/site/2012/05/chosen-people-on-abuse-redemption/
• Cardinal O'Malley:
It's Not Over Yet. Interview with John L. Allen. The
National Catholic Reporter, Jan. 6, 2012.
http://ncronline.org/blogs/all-things-catholic/omalley-sex-abuse-crisis-its-not-behind-us
• What the Church Has
Learned Over the Past Ten Years. Bernard Nojadera. USCCB Media
Blog, Dec. 28, 2011.
http://usccbmedia.blogspot.com/2011/12/sexual-abuse-of-children-ten-years-of.html
• "The John Jay
Study--What It Is and What It Isn't." Mary Gail Frawley O'Dea.
National Catholic Reporter/NCR Online, July 19, 2011.
http://ncronline.org/news/accountability/john-jay-study-what-it-and-what-it-isnt
• "Dealing with Catholic
Frustration." Tom Gibbons. BustedHalo, February 2011.
www.bustedhalo.com/blogs/catholic-frustration-within-the-ranks
• "Survivor Stories--Seven Lessons
from the Sex Abuse Crisis." Diane Knight, U.S. Catholic,
January 2011.
http://www.uscatholic.org/church/2010/11/survivor-stories-7-lessons-sex-abuse-crisis
• Two Perspectives on the Sexual
Abuse Crisis by John Allen, National Catholic Reporter/NCR
Online, December 24, 2010.
http://ncronline.org/blogs/all-things-catholic/benedict-xvi-and-tom-doyle-crisis
• "Seven Myths About the Catholic
Church and Clergy Sexual Abuse" by David Gibson, Catholic
Update, September 2010.
http://www.americancatholic.org/Newsletters/CU/preview.aspx?id=242
• "Sticking with an Imperfect
Church" by Melissa Musick Nussbaum, National Catholic
Reporter July 20, 2010.
http://ncronline.org/news/faith-parish/sticking-imperfect-church-fit
• "Twelve Things the Bishops Have
Learned from the Sex Abuse Crisis" by Bishop Blaise Cupich. May
10, 2010.
http://www.americamagazine.org/content/article.cfm?article_id=12272
• Text of an editorial on Vatican
Radio by the Vatican's official spokesman,
Fr. Federico Lombardi. April 9, 2010.
http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1342846?eng=y
•
“Six Points You Don’t Hear About
Clergy Sexual Abuse.” Dr. Thomas Plante. Psychology
Today, March 24, 2010.
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/do-the-right-thing/201003/six-important-points-you-dont-hear-about-regarding-clergy-sexual-abus
•
Pope Benedict XVI's Pastoral Letter
to the People of Ireland, March 20, 2010.
http://ncronline.org/news/text-popes-letter-catholics-ireland
•
Interview with Msgr. Charles J.
Scicluna, "promoter of justice" in the
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith,
in
L'Avvenire, March 13, 2010.
http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1342484?eng=y
•
"The Abuse Crisis, Prodigal
Sons -- and Missing Mothers" on America
magazine's blog, March 13, 2010.
http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=2&id=62038595-3048-741E-7967010082079329
• "Sexual Abuse and Children: Where
Are We Now? St. Anthony Messenger
Magazine, January 2010.
http://www.americancatholic.org/Messenger/Feb2010/Feature2.asp
•
“The
Catholic Church and Child Sexual Abuse” in America
magazine,
April 22, 2002.
http://www.americamagazine.org/gettext.cfm?textID=1721&articleTypeID=1&issueID=369
•
St. Anthony Messenger
(special issue) June 2003.
http://www.americancatholic.org/News/ClergySexAbuse/
• "Healing the Wound" by Eugene Kennedy in
National Catholic
Reporter, October 3, 2003.
http://natcath.org/NCR_Online/archives2/2003d/100303/100303a.htm
•
“On Carrying a Scandal
Biblically” by Fr. Ron Rolheiser.
www.ronrolheiser.com/pdfs/scandal.pdf
You may also find
some of Fr. Rolheiser syndicated columns helpful, even if they
do not directly address the abuse issue. You can access past
columns at:
www.ronrolheiser.com/columnarchive
•
“Beyond Crime and Punishment” by
Fr. Richard Rohr in the
July/August issue of Sojourners
magazine.
http://www.sojo.net/index.cfm?action=magazine.article&issue=soj0207&article=020711
•
“Answering Scandal
with Personal Holiness” homily by Fr. Thomas Landry
http://catholiceducation.org/articles/religion/re0526.html
• "Can the Church be Healed?" by Archbishop Harry
Flynn
http://www.usccb.org/comm/flynn.shtml
•
Continuing coverage in U.S.
Catholic magazine.
http://uscatholic.claretians.org/site/PageServer?pagename=usc_webspecial_sexabusecrisis
•
Fr. Jack Wintz’s “Friar Jack’s E-Inspirations”
for April 8, 2002.
www.americancatholic.org/e-news/FriarJack/fj040802.asp
• “Prayer in a Time
of Church Crisis” by the Daughters of St. Paul.
http://www.daughtersofstpaul.com/church/prayer/guidedpryerfidelity.html
• Reflection on the virtue of hope, provided by
Spirituality & Practice:
http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/practices/practices.php?id=12&g=0
•
"Healing Your Painful Memories" by
M. Elaine Dillhunt OSB
http://www.americancatholic.org/Newsletters/CU/ac0190.asp
• "The Hand of God," a
video documentary which depicts the impact of clerical sexual abuse on
one person and their family.
Caution: this video contains frank descriptions of sexual
conduct--viewer discretion advised.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/handofgod/
•
For a bibliography of
books about the sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic Church go
to:
http://www.bishop-accountability.org/books/
______________________________________________________________________
Return to Sex Abuse Home Page
Created 05.07 • Last Update
05.11.12 |