Over at the Current, I have a post up on Benedict XVI's meeting with the sex-abuse victims.
« Baracky | Main | More Cosby » The Pope and the Scandal18 Apr 2008 01:12 pm Comments (25)
What Jeff says and points to - as with most large institutions the first thought was CYA - and I am not talking the Catholic Youth Association. Had this not become public, and were huge amounts of money not involved, would Ratzinger have said or done anything? Jesus wept. 
I'd recommend reading the letter in question... you can find it here. While I firmly believe that anyone can speak truth, when it comes to the Guardian, sometimes I read more closely and do a bit more background reading. In this case, there's no sound reason to conclude that B16's approach to the victims of priestly sexual abuse is political or calculated. Numerous commenters across the ecclesial spectrum have noted that he is far more familiar than probably any other Catholic leader with the problems, in that (precisely because of the letter in question) he is familiar with all of the episodes of abuse, and it has -- again, according to those across the spectrum -- impacted him.
Chris expectorates: "Numerous commenters across the ecclesial spectrum have noted that he is far more familiar than probably any other Catholic leader with the problems, in that (precisely because of the letter in question) he is familiar with all of the episodes of abuse, and it has -- again, according to those across the spectrum -- impacted him." Yeah, sure - he probably enjoyed the pictures. The fact is that when the kiddie-raping was going on Ratzinger was one of the chief agents of the cover-up. And when he gets back to Rome he'll probably have a good laugh over this pontiff-gobbling press coverage of his "sincere apology" with his good and dear friend Bernard Law, one of the biggest kiddie-pimps in American history.
"The fact is that when the kiddie-raping was going on Ratzinger was one of the chief agents of the cover-up." Not that you can actually demonstrate this in any way, Moe. But vitriol without substance has been your m.o. here, so why would you change now? Why always so angry, anyway? Your pontificating (intended) doesn't really have any effect, so why not relax and have a drink. Bury that nihilism of yours in a bottle.
I will try to say this without Moe's vitriol. But the problem with meetings like this is that the real issue with the Church and the sex abuse scandal is that the hierarchy moved the priests around and therefore knowingly placed abusive priests in new parishes where they could prey on fresh victims. If any corporation did this, you'd be looking at criminal prosecutions of the supervisors, bankrupting punitive damages, and, obviously, everyone who moved an abuser to a new position would be fired. Plus, all corporate records relating to the issue would need to be turned over to the government for immediate examination and prosecution. And nobody who was involved gets to leave the jurisdiction. In contrast, the Church asserted phony legal privileges, still refuses to produce its complete records to law enforcement, has kept most of the bishops involved in place, and has acted as if it has the right to self-police, which is an absolute nonstarter when we are talking about the prevention of child rape, which is as clearly within the authority of secular institutions as anything one can think of. Further, it spirited Cardinal Law-- who knows a lot and who also is potentially subject to prosecution-- to the Vatican. The pope is therefore essentially harboring a fugitive and obstructing justice. Meeting with the victims is quite literally the least the pope can do. It has nothing to do with the real issue, and simply is an occasion for the pope's defenders and yes-men to go on television and praise him for his understanding of the situation and handling of the sex abuse problem. The hierarchy gets to "move on" without ever turning over the documents that would reveal who knew what and when, who committed crimes, and what members of the hierarchy need to be questioned, threatened with prosecution, and fired.
Dilan, I agree with much of what you write here... honestly. The way that some bishops handled abusive priests is very disturbing. I would contest, though, your claim that the hierarchy is moving on, or gets to do so. The bishops of the US have taken and continue to take steps to do virtually everything possible to ensure that no child in Catholic care is ever abused again. Obviously this isn't to say that it definitively will not happen again, but if you look at what the dioceses across the country are doing with "save environment" programs, you'll find that the bishops are setting themselves a high standard. It's obviously far too late for the hundreds of kids who were abused by priests, and it doesn't address the issue which you raise (i.e. bishops who seemingly get off scott-free), but it is definitely something.
Should Cardinal Law have been prosecuted? Probably yes. However, Thomas Reilly (than Attorney General of Massachusetts) had already announced his decision not to prosecute Law well before he got his Vatican job. Well-meaning people keep repeating the line that this was done to spirit him away from prosecution, but the chronology is wrong. Also, the article to which Dan links is misleading. The term "pontifical secret" means that the specific details of church court proceedings are kept confidential until the trial is over but does not mean that the crime can not be independently reported to civil authorities. This interpretation is supported by Fr. Thomas Doyle, one of the few priests to be an unambiguous hero of this tale. (He warned the bishops of the upcoming storm and advised them to root all pedophiles in 1985). See points 16 and 17 of this document by Fr. Doyle, discussing an earlier Vatican decree that used the same phrase: http://www.richardsipe.com/Doyle/Commentary_on_Crimen_Sollicitationis_11-1-06.pdf Furthermore, while there are many honorable men among the lawyers who have sued the Church, Daniel Shea, the Houston lawyer featured in the Guardian article, seems to be mainly a publicity hound.
James: The decision not to prosecute Law doesn't end the matter. Law has valuable evidence which he needs to stay in the jurisdiction in order to give. Further, if the Church turned over all of its files to the government, perhaps there would be evidence that would cause the authorities to reinitiate proceedings aginast Law. Prosecution isn't an on-off thing; rather, prosecutors build cases over time. That's why obstructing a prosecution by spiriting a material witness and possible suspect out of the jurisdiction, and refusing to turn over records, is so bad. As for plaintiff lawyers being publicity hounds, you are describing a phenomenon that is neither new nor limited to the Catholic sex abuse scandal. But that doesn't justify hardball litigation tactics and refusal to produce church records about molestations. Finally, I am sure Doyle was acting honorably, but "rooting out all pedophiles" only goes so far. Unfortunately, any organization that involves ministering to youth (including secular organizations like camps and the Boy Scouts) will, over time, attract some pedophiles. The important thing that not enough people in the Church hierarchy were doing was and is turning in all offenders and suspected offenders, and providing all relevant evidence of potential offenses, to the police. The Church apparently was governed by a belief that it had the right to police itself. This was a convenient belief that allowed it to keep pedophile priests in the system and avoid embarrassment, of course. But the Church doesn't have any right to police itself with respect to child abuse, any more than any other youth organization does. At the first sign or report of abuse, the Church needed to call the police and turn over all relevant records, information, and witnesses for police investigation. Every time. And the only true heroes in this story would be people within the hierarchy urging THAT.
Despite the chattering of cynics and hard-edged secularists, Benedict XVI made it clear that he is deeply ashamed of the the priests who betrayed their vows of chastity, which most priests do uphold. The other point is that unlike mainline Protestant churches that have caved to secular pieties regarding homosexual behavior, Benedict XVI presides over a church that has held the line, as the following parts of its Catechism make clear: #2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.” They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved. Long after the contemporary fashions and passions of the sexual "revolution" expire, these truths will be upheld.
Peter: I am not going to engage you in a debate about homosexuality. You are dead wrong, but the more important point is talking about homosexuality is changing the subject. The subject is that the Church continues to NOT turn over all of its files, has secreted a material witness and possible suspect (Cardinal Law) out of jurisdictional reach, has NOT fully cooperated with law enforcement, and has NOT fired all the numerous bishops and others in the hierarchy who moved priests around and withheld information from law enforcement. THAT's the entire issue. That is what responsible people do when child abuse is detected in their organization. Calling that "hard edged secularism" is offensive-- children who are molested by Catholic priests are entitled to exactly the same protection from our secular authorities as children molested by leaders of any other youth group. ANY diversion-- to how Benedict met with the victims, to a discussion of gay priests, or anything else-- is inappropriate, because justice has not yet been done. The bishops who facilitated these dastardly crimes still have their jobs, and we still don't have all the information that the Church kept in its records regarding the repeated and extensive rapes.
Dilan, I happen to live in the Boston area and have followed this matter closely. First, the Church responded fully to any requests or subpoenas for information in its files on priests. Second, the Attorney General of the Commonwealth decided not to prosecute Cardinal Law. The notion that the Church has "secreted" Cardinal Law in Rome is a canard. The liberal anti-Catholics have extracted more than their pound of flesh from a church that for the most part has faced this issue squarely. Truth to be told the Church is now dealing with a strong liberal reaction against its attempt to bar homosexually inclined men from its seminaries, a policy that Benedict XVI strongly supports.
Dilan, I happen to live in the Boston area and have followed this matter closely. First, the Church responded fully to any requests or subpoenas for information in its files on priests. Second, the Attorney General of the Commonwealth decided not to prosecute Cardinal Law. The notion that the Church has "secreted" Cardinal Law in Rome is a canard. Peter, you are pretending as if the scandal was limited to Boston. Here in Los Angeles, where I live, the Church has STILL not produced its records, first sought several years ago, still hasn't fired Cardinal Mahony or the other church leaders who reassigned priests, and still is fighting attempts by prosecutors and attorneys of victims to obtain evidence and testimony. However, even with respect to Boston, you are wrong. You are relying way too much on a statement by the Boston prosecutors that they don't intend to prosecute Law. That can change in the future, depending on what is discovered. Further, they may want to come back and ask Law more questions as the investigation proceeds. In short, he is a material witness and he is never coming back from the Vatican to respond to any more questions. Yes, I think "secreting" is the correct term here. Further, you are overstating the church's cooperativeness by far. First, the scandal itself was that Law and other Boston diocese officials never called the police with respect to numerous abusing priests, instead reassigning them. So for decades, there was no cooperation with law enforcement whatsoever. Even after the scandal broke, the Boston archdiocese continued to fight all efforts to disclose the information it had about abusive priests. To choose one example, the diocese fought for 4 years in court (2002 to 2006) to prevent disclosure to newspapers of its records about abusive priests that had been ordered turned over to victims' lawyers. You want to portray this as an issue of gay priests and liberal critics of the Church who are using the scandal as an excuse to criticize the Church. But only a beast would say such a thing. I want you to think back to when you were 9 years old. Suppose you were an altar boy, entrusted by your parents to the person they believed was a representative of God. That representative of God took you into his confidence, taking an apparent liking to you and inviting you to see his offices in the Church. Once there, he anally rapes you, without lube, and tells you that if you tell your parents that God will send you to hell. He does this over and over again, and as a confused, innocent 9 year old, you do nothing, as he says. Later, you finally get the courage to tell a teacher. The priest disappears and you never hear from him again. You become antisocial and need expensive and intensive psychological counseling the rest of your life. Meanwhile, 20 years later, you find out that the same priest was reassigned to another parish, where he anally raped 13 other kids, tearing their lives apart. The Church officials not only reassigned him, but they didn't tell the people of the new parish about the priest's record. They didn't call the police. And when a police investigation finally started, the Church asserted every legal argument available to prevent discovery of the records of what they did. To this day, the Bishop who reassigned that priest still sits in his position. Nobody but a few of the priests lost their job or went to prison. Now, multiply that scenario by 150 or 200 other instances, in which the Church did the same thing. You want to change the subject to homosexuality or the Church's liberal critics. I think child rape is such a horrible thing, and that refusing to hold people accountable for facilitating it is also such a horrible thing, that I can't imagine why someone would advocate changing that subject.
Dilan, I'll be honest, I think that child rapists should be shot, whether they be parents, step-parents, teachers, priests, or random passersby. I think that the death penalty law that is currently under Supreme Court review in Louisiana is a very good thing. I presume you don't support the death penalty for child rapists (or anyone, for that matter). Would it then be fair for me to accuse you of being soft on child rapists? I might further ask-- do you, in fact, support the death penalty for child rapists? If not, then why not? Wouldn't that do more to avenge the rape of children than what you accuse the Catholic church of not doing? Btw, I should make it clear that I'm not a Catholic, I deplore the way that church oficials covered up these cases, and I think that the pederastic priests should be executed or imprisoned as the law prescribes. parenthetically, I'm not really sure I know what lube is, and I'm quite sure that I don't want to know. The fact that you act as if we ought to know the graphic details of such acts is a disturbing example of how sexual abberrations have become normalized. Ugh.
Hector: The death penalty is inconsistently enforced, and it is very difficult to apply because it is irreversible and we have found that the danger of executing an innocent person is intolerable. Further, the Catholic Church teachings are exactly right that the death penalty is insufficiently respectful of human life. (And yes, it is different than abortion.) That said, I think life or near-life prison sentences for child rapists are just fine. But I don't understand your point. When a bishop decides to reassign a child rapist, no prison sentence at all results. Indeed, no arrest results. No firing results. If you think that opposing the death penalty is insufficiently respectful of the enormity of child rape, than what the Bishops did is more insufficiently respectful by a factor of 10,000. Finally, I was graphic for a reason. I think that there is a great desire among defenders of the Church's conduct to change the subject to homosexuality, or liberal critics of the church, or how Benedict XVI has supposedly put in safeguards against future abuse. By discussing exactly what was done to these kids, I hoped to show that these discussions are insufficiently respectful of exactly what went on here. Taking on liberal critics in the church or homosexual conduct, whatever one thinks of either of these things, is a clearly inadequate response to the scenario I described.
Dilan, The real 'difference' with abortion is that you think it's perfectly OK to kill innocent children, but that there's something wrong with killing child rapists. Well, I think that's a disgusting world view. I believe that innocent life should be protected to the fullest extent possible. When someone has transgressed the moral or legal norms of society, then the state has the moral right to execute them. In some circumstances, execution can actually be an act of mercy: taking a person's life in order to promote their _spiritual_ reformation. Please read some Plato. I can't believe you are actually in favor of protecting the 'right' of guilty pederasts to live, but not the right of perfectly innocent unborn children. A quick and no-questions-asked execution of child rapists, Chinese style, would do much to stop the epidemic of perversion in this country. The Catholic church needs to do its part, but you guys need to do your part too, and that means to get out of the way of the state legislatures that wants to give pederasts what they deserve.
First, I am not going to go round and round with you on abortion again. A quick and no-questions-asked execution of child rapists, Chinese style, would do much to stop the epidemic of perversion in this country. Hector, you can't on the one hand base your defense of capital punishment on the fact that the defendants are guilty, and then say that your preferred system is a Chinese-style quick execution. Or are you aware that many of the people whom are executed by the Chinese government are, in fact, innocent? In any event, what I am against is trying to change the subject. As I said, thanks to the Catholic Church Bishops, many child molestors were not only not executed, they weren't imprisoned and weren't arrested. Instead, they were given new jobs access to fresh victims. Diverting to whether we need the death penalty for child rape is one more attempt to shift the focus anywhere but where it belongs, which is on the Catholic Church hierarchy which is still refusing to produce relevant documents, cooperate with law enforcement, or fire the Bishops who transferred priests. That's the only issue here. It is deplorable to try and change the subject.
Dilan, I wasn't trying to change the subject. I agree with you that the church did not do enough to bring the child molesters to justice. Of course, I don't think that's an argument for the Church being a bad institution on the whole any more than I think that about the various public school districts that have had teachers who molest their students. I brought up the death penalty since we were on th topic of child rape and I was curious to know what you thought about it. It _does_ happen to be in the news at the moment, as you might have noticed. While I think that the state should make every reasonably effort to make sure that executed criminals are, in fact, guilty of the crimes they are executed for, and while I think it's a tragedy whenever anyone innocent is executed, I don't think that the fact that innocent people are inevitably executed _in error_ and _in good faith_ casts doubt on the morality of the death penalty. Please look up 'the principle of double effect.'
Hector: Please steer clear of accusations of inconsistency regarding abortion and the death penalty; argue each issue seperately and on the merits. Otherwise, you might run into someone like myself that is both pro-life and opposed to the death penalty (I should add that this admonition also applies to practically every other person arguing culture war issues as well). As to the actual merits of the issue, I don't think you can ignore the realities of our criminal justice system in advocating the death penalty. Just because a hypothetical system might have a better record at executing the most heinous criminals, rather than the poorest and those minorities disproportionately, doesn't mean that we will ever have any such system. We can argue about how many wrongful executions are an acceptable cost, but the realities of the system as it exists are unavoidable.
I believe in executing child rapists, with a few provisos. *The perpetrator is over 18. (This is required in general for executions) I know I am Catholic, but the idea that the Catholic Church forbids all execution is a modern notion. It is not fully supported by anything in Tradition, the Councils, or Catechism. In fact it is clearly contradicted by those things. If the Catholic Church in America opposes all war and all execution it is, in essence, in heresy. I do not feel bound to honor the opinions of heretical bishops merely because they live in my geographical location. (And this should be the basis of firing bishops. A good many of the worse ones on this matter were also heretics of some kind) That said the Church's view is that execution is, ideally, to be used only rarely and may no longer be necessary at all due to modern science. However I think at times the Church showed too great a faith in modern psychiatry or neurochemistry. The Church's sincere hope those things ended the existence of "non-rehabilitatable criminals" seems very premature in retrospect and was even dangerous. Therefore I think those who remain a consistent danger to other people may, I think within Catholic norms, be executed.
Of course, I don't think that's an argument for the Church being a bad institution on the whole any more than I think that about the various public school districts that have had teachers who molest their students. Hector, I don't think the Catholic Church is a "bad institution" because of what it did. What I object to is the pope's defenders claiming that this is simply an issue about gay priests, or that liberal critics are blowing this out of proportion, or similar things. And what I really object to is claims that because, say, Benedict XVI met with victims (as he should have done), that this means we can "move forward" and close the book on the scandal. This is a serious scandal, and it is not over, because the people who perpetrated it (i.e., not simply the priests, but the bishops and others in the hierarchy who moved people around and covered things up) still have their jobs and the Church still has not fully cooperated with law enforcement. If the Church turns all of its records over to the police, makes public all of the actions of those in the hierarchy and lets us know everyone who was involved in the decision to move molesting priests around and not report their crimes to the police, and removes the bishops who did such things, at that point, we can talk about whether it makes sense to have gays in the priesthood or whether liberal critics are going overboard or whether it is time to move on. But-- and it's funny I have to say this about the Catholic Church, given it is precisely their own doctrine about repentence-- in order to move on, first you have to take full responsibility and accept the consequences for your actions. And the Church hierarchy has still not done that.
Dilan, I don't know that I really disagree with you on the merits here. The American Catholic church hierarchy, whatever you think of their theology, is indeed greatly at fault for not having brought its criminal priests to justice, and it is going to have to pay a price for that. Of course, nothing this side of the grave can ever really bring real justice and restitution to the victims who were robbed of their childhood. I have no doubt that many people will leave the church over the child rape scandals and I don't really blame them, although it is sad when anyone loses their faith. I disagree with you substantively over the death penalty, homosexuality, and many other issues including about how best to deal with the epidemic of pederasty in America. But i agree with you this isn't the place for those arguments. It diminishes the suffering of the victims to qualify their tragedy or put it into perspective or compare it to other evils. there's a time for simply sorrowing and recognizing the wrong that was done, and this is it.
Chris quotes and writes: ""The fact is that when the kiddie-raping was going on Ratzinger was one of the chief agents of the cover-up." Not that you can actually demonstrate this in any way, Moe. But vitriol without substance has been your m.o. here, so why would you change now?" Ah, the usual charge of "vitriol" from some lemming-minded wingnut. How that hurts! You're right, I should refrain from using "vitriol" when discussing a multi-national conspiracy to cover up child rape and protect the rapists. I should try to put a smiley face on it, like Pope Benedict is doing, and like Chris thinks I should. Okay. I'll try. Pope Benedict and Chris think child rape doesn't call for vitriol, so... ah screw it. They're wrong. I know Pope Benedict runs an organization which has a huge financial and political reason for trying to downplay the child rape scandal. I don't know what Chris's motives are. I don't care, either. I have, of course, shown Ratzinger's letter that says incidences of child rape should be covered up - I did this when TMoC reflexively said I had no evidence for my charges about Ratzinger's role in the cover-up. I could find the link and post it again, but let's face it - Chris doesn't actually care about the facts here. He doesn't care that Ratzinger/Benny wanted child rape by priests covered up. He just doesn't want any "vitriol" used during discussions about child rape by priests and the disgusting response by the Church. Benedict deserves to be applauded for being NICE about the issue and meeting with handpicked victims! He's APOLOGIZED, so no more vitriol! Meanwhile Bernard Law still has his vitriol-free sinecure, and Chris - who is all about "substance" - thinks all is well. Go Cheney yourself, Chris. And if you're sore afterwards, just dab a little vitriol on the sore spots.
Hector writes: "I'm not really sure I know what lube is, and I'm quite sure that I don't want to know. The fact that you act as if we ought to know the graphic details of such acts is a disturbing example of how sexual abberrations have become normalized. Ugh." Hector, join the priesthood. No woman (in the event that you're straight, which I actually doubt more with every one of your posts) needs to be bothered with your incredible sexual ignorance. Get over yourself and join the human race. "Lube" has a prosaic meaning that most of us learn before the age of 10, and if you can't extrapolate it into a sexual context I suggest you're either stupid or pathological or both. Now go look up "santorum."
Actually, Moe, it's the vitriol *without substance* that makes you not worth taking seriously. You rant, rave, and insult, presumably in your little attempt to rage against the machine. To what end, Moe? All it does is render you the more easily ignorable. Drink that nihilism away. It might make you feel better about yourself.
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Benedict has been more forthright? Maybe, but only because he's had to be. Have you forgotten this episode:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/apr/24/children.childprotection
Posted by Jeff | April 18, 2008 5:52 PM