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What have we done to our children? What horrors have befallen them? Have we abandoned them to the rough streetswithout any care for their well-being – or did we simply send them to Church where they would be taught about God’s love?
What they learned there has so changed them that they have vowed never to enter such a place again. They have withdrawn from their families, their friends -- from their own children. They have asked themselves: What’s wrong with me that I was chosen to be molested? Why didn’t I resist or tell someone? What is wrong with me? Does God hate me?
Yes, these poor children, now grown, still blame themselves. They go over every detail in the constant replay of their abuse looking for the moment when they could have stopped it from happening. If only they had been braver. If only they hadn’t been afraid to say NO! -- to a priest.
The Voice of the Faithful has heard their cry and with our voices raised on their behalf we are telling them, finally, that they are no longer alone. That we will speak out to the clergy, the bishops, the Archbishops, the Curia, the watchdog of the Church: the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Indeed, where is the Congregation for the Protection of the Children? (We who are so concerned with the protection of the “innocent life” of the unborn.)
These “innocent” children have been paid off to go away and leave the Church to continue in its’ secrecy, its dishonesty, its hierarchical hubris. They have hired lawyers to get money for their suffering because they were considered too unreliable, too mentally unstable to be the witnesses that were needed to get a criminal conviction. Because so much time had elapsed many were unable to bring a case at all because of the ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court. The rights of the accused held up over the rights of the abused!
So, as these men were never adjudicated then they cannot be registered as sex offenders. They live among us without having served the prison time they so justly deserved. Forgiven by their bishops, reassigned to abuse again, be forgiven again. No answering for their crime. No justice. Just forgiveness and protection. Silence. Finally the cycle was broken by the abused, the lawyers, and the press. Those jackals who have no respect for the Church!
And what now? In Boston, where the scandal first broke the faithful responded with wonderful power yet after months of criminal investigation the Church continued to circle the wagons. Not until Cardinal Law was threatened with an indictment and asked to resign by 58 brave priests, did he finally resign. His punishment? A sinecure in Rome as the Archpriest of St. Mary Major Basilica and, as such, allowed to say one of nine masses for his friend, Pope John Paul II’s funeral. He was even interviewed on ABC news as a result of this promotion and seemed surprised to be asked about the scandal now that it was safely behind him. No extradition treaty.
Here in California, Archbishop Levada, promoted to Pope Benedict’s old job as the prelate of the Doctrine of the Congregation of the Faith, has now left his post as the Archbishop who covered up abuses in Portland and here and then paid for them before his triumphal departure to his new exalted post in the Vatican. Only a tiny retinue of abused silently holding signs outside his final mass gave an almost totally ignored cry for justice. Inside, in the sacristy the sister of an abused woman handed the Archbishop a subpoena, which he only accepted after she threatened to serve it to him as he served the mass. The San Francisco Chronicle was full of pictures of the faithful kissing his ring and one small picture of the abused outside. No mention of the subpoena. After all this is a Catholic city and this is the send off of our star. Local hero makes good!
The settlements keep coming. The churches keep closing. The donations keep shrinking. The faithful keep leaving. So many gone already. No priests to minister to us. Shall we continue to take the unbalanced: pedophiles, ephebephiles? Shall we be content with the overflow of third world priests who are flocking to the Church for reasons of social status and regular meals? Will they understand us? Our language? Our customs? Where are our vocations? Is our Church dying? Did it lose its way after Vatican II’s glorious renewal? Did we forget its call to us to stand up and enter into true dialogue with one another? Priests and laity together building Christ’s Church?
What have we done to our children? Are we so sunk in our fear of the truth that we dare not speak it? Do we choose obedience to the ordained clergy as they do to the bishops no matter what evil resides there?
The Church is not a democracy! No, it is not even an enlightened oligarchy.
It is a closed and secret society in which no light shines. Where the leader is protected by his absolute power. In 1870 Lord Acton, a British historian and devout and influential Catholic, tried to dissuade the Curia from promulgating the doctrine of papal infallibility. Many left the Church at that time but he stayed. Lamenting, what he saw as the terrible result it would cause, he wrote:“ Power tends to corrupt, absolute power corrupts absolutely.” So it is not the abusers who after all were mentally ill or mentally unbalanced that we must fear most. We must hold accountable the bishops who protected them. What was their excuse? Were they protecting priests over children? Or were they protecting the system, their fiefdom? The doctrine of “infallibility” spread far and wide. We may not question these exalted beings. The indwelling of the Holy Spirit is not guaranteed by the taking of holy orders. He must be invited in over and over again as we proceed through the traps and snares of out lives.
Let us take the case of Marcial Maciel Degollado, the former head of the Legionaries of Christ, a wealthy Mexican order, which he founded in 1941. Although credible allegations of sexual abuse of nine of his own novices have been supported by respected ordained clergy for twenty years, no investigation has been undertaken in Rome. The reason seems to be that he has powerful friends in the Curia, including Pope John Paul, II. Based on new allegations, it is reported that an investigation started last November by Cardinal Ratziger in his role as the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) has been dropped. This account comes from the Legionaries as verified by a fax from the office of the Secretary of State but not by the CDF who has the sole authority to open and close such investigations. Archbishop Levada has refused to answer our petition asking him to continue the investigation to its conclusion and to issue a statement confirming that from the CDF.
These tragic events have called us to examine our own consciences. We must stand still and ask ourselves --What would Christ do? Isn’t that the only question we need to answer? Even when He was under the scourge He spoke truth to power though He knew the price. He expects no less from us. How can we forgive ourselves for continuing to remain silent? We must make our voices heard for our children’s sake so that we can say with confidence that our Church is a place where they, and we, will be safe and will find God’s love
September 2005
San Francisco
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