How to Talk About the Sexual Abuse Scandal
Many have written on the sexual abuse scandal at length. Here are some brief thoughts of my own.
Tragic
I’m sure you’ve all seen how the sexual abuse scandal is once again ripping through the Church. It’s a sad, blood-boiling reality on a lot of different levels.
First, all of our priests are supposed to be holy men that we can trust. Second, the Church herself is supposed to be a light of the world (cf. Matthew 5:14), not the epitome of darkness and evil. Third, though the Church has had many scandals in the past, a lot of us (like myself) thought we were done with this one. Yet, it has returned and appears to be deeper and uglier than ever.
So, what should we be saying in response when people raise this issue? If they ask, “Why do you still give your money to an institution that fosters predatory priests who abuse children, teenagers, adults, and then cover it up?”
Three Points
I don’t think our first response should be defense but rather compassion. Our hearts and prayers should go out to all of the victims, and we hope that the guilty men are brought to justice. At the same time, we hope that the good priests and leaders we know will rise up and take charge in the Church. That may be as far as the conversation needs to go. You can mention to your friend that we want to see all the details come out, all of the evil exposed, and that the Church be cleansed of these terrible sins (guilty Priests and Bishops should go to jail).
Second, there’s the all-important Catholic question. Why do we still attend and give money to this Church? Well, it’s a simple reason. Because we believe this is the Church Jesus established. If this is Jesus’s Church, then no matter how much filth enters in (there’s been a lot in the past and a lot now), we have to stay here because we want to stay with Christ. As Tim Staples from Catholic Answers likes to say, “We can’t leave Jesus because of Judas.”
Third, we need to pray. We must pray for the victims, for our priests, and for our bishops. We should pray that our Lord’s justice will be done. That those who have committed evil will repent. That the upright and good clergymen rise up to oversee the Church. That those whose lives have been crushed by sexual abuse will receive our Lord’s healing and consolation.
I think those are the three most important points right now.
Nothing New?
On a somewhat positive note, I have not seen any new and recent cases coming out of the headlines. In other words, I haven’t seen claims of widespread sex-abuse after 2002/2003. It’s all old stuff coming to light. I’m open to being corrected on this if I’m wrong, but I just haven’t seen it.
Nonetheless, that’s still negative, since it’s stuff that should have come out in the past and been dealt with. One of the biggest evils seems to be all the people that kept silent and covered up the problem rather than revealing it to appropriate authorities and taking action.
Lastly, the biggest evil seems to be people in power acting in a predatory way and subsequently protecting each other. All of that needs to be exposed and stamped out as soon as possible.
Three Good Resources
If you want to go deeper, I highly recommend these links. They explain more details of the sexual abuse scandal and how to talk about it.
1) Joe Heschmeyer recently recorded a very insightful podcast on the issue. Check it out. Joe is a former seminarian and a devout Catholic. He has unique insights on the matter.
2) Trent Horn recorded a podcast on how to discuss the scandal. UPDATE: He recorded a newer podcast going into more of the details in the wake of the Pennsylvania report.
3) Catholic Answers posted an article on DO’s and DONT’s of discussing the scandal.
Your post is helpful – thank you.
The following is NOT in anyway intended to excuse the evils done in the catholic Church. However, just as it helps patients to know that they are not the only one suffering from a specific disease, it may help to understand that the evils in the catholic Church are not unique. Toward that end, do you think the following links to a reporter’s summary and scientific study are useful background for your readers?
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/valerie-tarico/the-protestant-clergy-sex_b_740853.html
http://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/9/1/27
John,
Thanks for the comment. I think that information is definitely helpful in showing that our sexual problems are systemic in society (not just in the Catholic Church). As you note, I just don’t want to come across as *excusing* the situation or engaging in “whataboutism” (i.e. “Yeah, but what about public educators and Protestant clergy!?”). Nonetheless, those articles are statistics are an important part of the story. Thanks for sharing them.
What kills the Catholic Church is the massive cover-ups that seem to take place involving clerics of the highest authority. As such, stories from 20, 30, or 40 years ago, never got proper exposure, and consequently never got proper closure or justice. We need exposure so we can have closure.
Thanks for your response. Does the following make sense:
The current focus on the sex abuse problem that occurred over the last 70 years in six diocese in Pennsylvania is horrific by any standard. However, the Church has always taught us that God can bring good out of terrible situations. Perhaps, some good will come. One possible path toward good is to use the recently reported horrors in the catholic Church to help address the much more widespread problem in society as a whole. The recent study published by Denny et al documents that the problem is at least as great in the Protestant churches. That is significant since there are more Protestants than Catholics. However, it does not take much searching to find abuses committed by Jewish rabbis. Cases have been reported in the United States education system. In addition, according to official US data (https://www.globalslaveryindex.org/2018/findings/country-studies/united-states/) , 5,591 potential cases of sex trafficking were reported in 2016. That is just the reported cases. The horrors committed against these victims are particularly horrid as they occur over potentially long periods of time.
Although clearly not sufficient, the catholic Church did take some positive actions against the problem of sex abuse within the Church. For one, it paid for an independent and thorough investigation of the extent of the problem. The resulting John Jay report originally published in 2004 informed the church of the magnitude of the problem (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Jay_Report). The Church took action. The actions appear to have worked, as evidence by the statement in the recent Pennsylvania Grand Jury report that “… almost every instance of abuse we found is too old to be prosecuted.” and “But that is not to say there are no more predators. This grand jury has issued presentments against a priest in the Greensburg diocese and a priest in the Erie Diocese, who has been sexually assaulting children within the last decade. We learned of these abusers directly from their dioceses – which we hope is a sign that the church is finally changing its ways.”.
With the grace of God, the lessons learned by the catholic Church, including lessons from actions that did work, actions that did not work, and actions that should have been taken but were not, will help to combat the much greater problem that results in child abuse throughout society. The recent Denny et al paper also has recommended interventions based on observations of abuses within Protestant churches. It would likely be of great benefit if all churches, schools and other organizations would initiate investigations of the full scope of the problem within their organization. That would be even better if they paid an independent and unbiased group to conduct the investigation as did the catholic Church.
The worst approach would be to maintain a narrow focus only the catholic Church, blinding people to the much, much greater problem in society as a whole. Many current abusers in non-catholic organizations and people with sex slaves at home may add their voices to conversations critical of the catholic Church and then go home or to work to commit worse atrocities feeling somewhat justified by participating in criticism against catholics. These current abusers may also become more sophisticated at concealing their crimes based on details about past cases. That does not help. It is much better to understand how wide spread is the problem and collectively implement wide-spread interventions. The suffering of many more children can prevented by a broad-minded approach.
John, thanks for taking the time to put together a lengthy comment. I think you get a lot right there. However, I would still hesitate to share all of that at once right now. Right now, people need to pray, fast, and do penance for the horrific sins that have been committed and covered up by the clergy. But what you write is certainly an important piece of the full narrative. Thanks again!