Fr. Roger J. Landry
The Anchor
Editorial
January 6, 2012
Ten years ago today, the Boston Globe published an article on the serial child abuse committed by Father John Geoghan, the suffering of his victims and their families, and the totally inadequate way that those in responsibility in the Archdiocese of Boston responded when they became aware of his sickening sins and crimes. In the following months, it became clear that the case of Father Geoghan was not isolated. Through journalistic investigations, grand jury probes and lawsuits, in Boston and in other parts of the United States, a filth that had been concealed for decades was brought to light: from 1950-2002, more than 4,200 U.S. priests had been accused of harming rather than serving the young people Jesus had entrusted to the Church’s care. It caused an unprecedented, self-inflicted scandal that has cost the Church not merely billions of dollars, but incalculably more in terms of the loss of souls and loss of respect for the Church, the priesthood, the episcopacy, and the Church’s moral authority.
Much has been learned in the decade since and the Church has enacted various canonical reforms, both at a national level and — after similar scandals came to light in Ireland, Germany, Belgium and several religious orders — at the level of the worldwide Church. Much still needs to be done. But the 10th anniversary of the beginning of the revelation of the scandals deserves to be marked by the Church as a type of Catholic Yom Kippur: a day of atonement in reparation for the sins of her members, in intercession for the healing of victims and their families, and in supplication to bring good out of this evil by purifying the Church, returning to her a true horror for sin, a genuine desire for holiness and fidelity, and a fire for integrity in living the Gospel Christ has sent the Church to preach. Just as God used the Assyrians in the eighth century BC to bring the people of Israel to conversion, so He seems to have allowed members of the media and various trial attorneys to bring the Church to deep and much needed repentance and reform.
As we look back over the past 10 years, we can note how much the Church in the United States has done to try to prevent the recurrence of the sexual abuse of minors. Beginning in Dallas in 2002, the U.S. bishops committed themselves to procedural reforms that involved the formation of independent review boards to investigate accusations, the removal from public ministry any priest who has admitted or been proven to have engaged in the abuse of a minor even once, genuine pastoral care for to those who have suffered abuse from Church ministers, background checks of Church employees and volunteers, and training both Church workers to recognize and report signs of abuse and young people to notice and report potential grooming behavior. The implementation of these notable reforms hasn’t been easy or uncontroversial, but over the course of the last decade, not only have many of these protocols become the model for dioceses throughout the world but also they have made the Catholic Church as rigorous as any institution in the United States in protecting young people.
Looking back over the course of the last decade, we can also note several other things we’ve learned.
First, the Catholic Church is not the only institution that has needed to confront the evil of sexual abuse within itself. The recent allegations against Jerry Sanduski and the Penn State football program show that sexual abuse of minors, and a failure to respond appropriately by those in responsibility, is not isolated. In fact, a recent study by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice compared the general statistics of clergy sex abuse in the U.S. Church to the reported incidence rates and responses in public schools, child care settings, the Boy Scouts, the Big Brothers-Big Sisters organization, athletic organizations, and various religious groups. It established that, although abuse within the Church has garnered by far the most attention, the sexual abuse of minors is a widespread social problem, and in some places, like public schools, the incidence of abuse is much higher and the response of those in authority just as bad as what was found in the Church prior to the reforms of 2002. This has led some to criticize those who have singled the Catholic Church out for attention.
The Church in justice legally should be treated no better or worse than other institutions, but we must admit, there is something implicitly good in this special attention, however unintended. There is the general understanding that the Church should morally be held to a higher standard than other institutions, that the expectations of conduct in the Church should be higher than in public schools, or Scouts, or athletic programs. Jesus set those higher expectations Himself in the Sermon on the Mount, insisting that His followers need to have their righteousness exceed that of even the most religious Jews and the most ethical gentiles. When the Church fails to live up to the basic standards of conduct, her failure at a moral level should be treated more severely. Corruptio optimi pessima, as the Latin aphorism states: “The corruption of the best is worst of all.” The extra attention to the Church even on the part of non-believers is a tacit recognition that the Church should live by the highest standards. The scandals have reminded us of this.
This leads to the second point. There is a valuable lesson about expectations Catholic faithful and society at large has for the Church in general with regard to addressing scandals. People recognize that some in every institution are not going to “walk the walk” but expect that those in positions of authority, once they find out about the disgraceful conduct, will respond with horror and resolve to eliminating the malpractice. The failure on the part of Church authorities to respond adequately to priests’ violating their priestly promises in major ways — for example, cheating on their vocations with women, or men, or the parish books, or theologically or pastorally abusing their people — is treated by the faithful as an even greater scandal than the conduct itself. The sexual abuse of minors is tragically not the only filth to be found within the Church and Church leaders need to be as resolute in eliminating conduct unbecoming of Church ministers who violate their promises and harm the people of God as it has been in the past decade with those who abuse rather than serve the young. The good of souls, not to mention the reputation of the Church, requires it.
Finally, in the Church’s zeal to demonstrate that things have radically changed with regard to the way she handles allegations of the sexual abuse against minors, she has been accused of making another class of victims, namely priests falsely accused of abusing minors. There have been several examples of priests whose ministries were curtailed and reputations destroyed who later were demonstrated to have been the victims of the most vile type of character assassination. There are many other priests who claim innocence and are still languishing in ministerial abeyance almost 10 years after having been accused, without any progress not to mention resolution to the ecclesiastical investigations. Some of their defenders have said that the way they have been treated is almost a mirror image of the inadequate responses on the part of Church leaders to prevent minors from being abused earlier.
Whereas in the past a potential priest abuser’s word of denial was often taken at face value, now, they charge, a proposed victim’s word of accusation is given the same weight, no matter what the priest says. Whereas formerly, many Church leaders seemed to put the good of the reputation and finances of the institutional Church above justice for victims, now, they say, the same thing is happening with regard to the way priests are being treated, that innocent priests are being sacrificed to show the Church’s toughness on sexual abuse. And whereas previously the problem was not so much a “bad policy” on the part of the Church to the abuse of minors but the failure of Church leaders rigorously to follow the policy, so today, they assert, the same problem persists in following the Church’s own guidelines in ensuring a quick and fair investigation and trial. The only difference, they say, is that whereas once the Church did not do justice in many places for the rights of accusers, now it’s not doing justice to the rights of the accused. This issue of justice — not to mention the serious rupture in the spiritual fraternity between bishops and priests that has ensued as a result — needs to be addressed and remedied in the years ahead.
The infamous 10th anniversary of the initial public revelation of the scandals is a renewed opportunity for contrition and for the firm purpose of amendment that flows from true contrition. It is also a learning opportunity for lessons that should never be forgotten.