I think Dr. Faggioli makes some good points. I do think the problem with this scandal which continues to give is a misplaced mercy on the victimizer and ignoring the victims. This mercy run amuck, if one studies the history of this crisis in the USA, was to forgive, heal and return to ministry abusive priests and all done under a code of silence and professional confidentiality. But mercy run amuck is what is at the root of this, a liberal 1970’s bleeding heart kind of mercy for victimizers.
Pope Francis seems to embrace this radical kind of enabling mercy. When he speaks about encounter with people in the LGBTQ+++ community, and being inclusive of them, I don’t hear a call for repentance and conversion based upon the teaching so the Risen Lord, His moral teaching and His example. Thus, one is left to believe that sin, even mortal sin, should be accepted and blessed.
And when it comes to spiritual abuse, Pope Francis’ in a cruel way completely reversing another pope’s allowance of the older forms of the Mass and sacraments and without dialogue with bishops and faithful involved in this liberal permission from Pope Emeritus I is spiritual abuse. The name calling, the psychological diagnosis, the obsession with “rigidity” are examples of this spiritual abuse. Massimo needs to name that and who is responsible for it.
That’s the way forward.
Press title for his commentary from the NCR:
12 comments:
One victim of a priest's sexual assault is a "crisis"...it is horrific. In that sense, we have a crisis.
But at least in regard to the United States, as well as well as France:
We do not have a "crisis" in regard to the popular image that a vast amount of priests have abused people sexually.
Even at its peak, said crisis involved a microscopic amount of priests who were just accused, not found guilty...but just accused of the horrific sin/crime of sexual abuse.
But that should be front and center, at least in the above-mentioned countries, in regard to the Synodal process?
In France, the priest sexual abuse crisis peaked 52 years ago.
-- In France, the majority of said abuse in the Church, 56 percent, occurred between 1950 and 1970.
-- 22 percent of sexual abuse attacks occurred between 1970 and 1990.
-- 22 percent between 1990 and 2020.
During the past few years in France, the amount of said cases is five times fewer than the overall average from 1950 to 2017.
======================================================================================
In 2018 A.D., the now-discredited Pennsylvania Report was accepted within, and without the Church, as proof of a raging massive priest-sexual abuse "crisis."
Little attention had been given to the fact that few cases of just accusations, not convictions, but just accusations against priests, had been reported since the early 2000s.
The 2002 A.D. Dallas Charter, as well as additional related measures, have been successful in having curbed dramatically the now non-crisis supposed "crisis" in question.
Pax.
Mark Thomas
I question Massimo Faggioli's judgement in regard to the supposed priest sexual abuse "crisis."
He, for example, had overreacted big-time...I mean big-time...to the garbage Pennsylvania Report. Said report had been discredited within a day or so of the report's issuance.
However, weeks later, he continued to promote said report as follows:
"I think it's the beginning of a very long journey. This is the most major crisis since the Protestant Reformation."
Has he noted, for example, that the "crisis" of priest-sexual-abuse that is "raging" in France supposedly, had peaked decades ago?
It is from 1950 A.D., TO 1970 A.D., that 56 percent of cases occurred. From there, an additional 22 percent of cases had been reported to 1990 A.D.
The current "crisis" has existed for centuries within the Church...and even at that, we are talking about a microscopic amount of priests who had performed the horrific acts in question.
Nevertheless, the popular image among many folks within, and without the Church, is that a vast amount of priests were/are sexual predators.
Pax.
Mark Thomas
MT, the crisis isn’t so much that a certain percentage of people, be they priests or not, molest and sexually abuse minors, but that a cover-up of these cases occurred, offending priests were forgiven and moved about and later given intensive psychiatric care, presume healed and placed back into ministry without those in the parishes where these priests were placed, knowing of the pathology the priest had, now supposedly forgiven and cured.
As for victims, it often takes them decades to come forward, either because they suppress memories of what happened, did not know it was abuse or they finally find the courage to come forward. Thus someone abused in 2022 might not come forward until 2052 or later.
What is unique about the Catholic Church’s experience of this is that bishops knew the priest abused and often in a serial way with many victims, and then recycled them into places to continue the pattern. We are speaking about the way it was prior to 2002 and maybe still in some places elsewhere in the world. What I have not completely understood is why bishops seem so callous toward potential young victims when they recycled priests who were serial abusers. Did they think it wan’t bad or harmful to these children. Were bishops themselves abused by clergy as children and they survived without much trauma thus others too would be okay. I don’t know! But I wonder.
Fr. ALLAN McDonald,
The motives of the bishops who moved abusive priests around aren't, I don't think, all that mysterious or unique. Unfortunately, we know that the same choices were made by "managers" in other organizations from religious denominations to school districts.
For the wrong reasons, bishops and others in similar positions of authority have chosen to protect their institutions rather than deal in an effective manner with the abusers. Some (many?) bishops believed that a person could be successfully treated and reintigrated into the presbyterate. I don't think any thought that the abuse wasn't harmful to children, but chose to protect the Church from the potential harm that might come from revealing the abuse.
In pre-Vatican II times, and well after Vatican II, it wasn’t just the bishops protecting the Church, but all Catholics who did not want to bring shame to the Church. This happened/happens in families too when crimes are committed by family members within the family, be it sexual, violence or something else illegal. Keep it quiet to protect the family’s name.
I remember when I was first ordained that a lay person told be about a priest once assigned to that parish in the 1950/60’s who “liked boys”. The parishioner complained to the bishop and the bishop reassigned him. He was please with that solution. But I doubt he spoke about this case with others in the parish, although some in the parish knew the priest to be a homosexual.
I think the same when a heterosexual took an interest in a young woman, minor or not, if it was discovered it was handled discretely to prevent scandal. Many parents of that period too, did not want their child’s abuse to become public in any way and they certainly didn’t want a public trial. They may have settled for a sum of money or just wanted the priest gone somewhere else.
The fear of scandal and stigma was and is still high and not just in bishops.
Father McDonald, thank you for your reply.
Father, as you noted, bishops covered for abusive bishops and priests (as well as additional folks). The situation was appalling.
What has alarmed me is that certain groups, within, and without, the Church, to advance their respective agendas, have pretended that the "crisis" is very much alive, and is rampant among priests.
Speaking generally...
-- The secular news media push the "crisis" angle to discredit the Church...to pretend that the Church is filled with predatory priests...children are not safe around priests.
-- The Church's left-wing has employed the "crisis" to attack priestly celibacy...to push for married (Western Church) priests, as well as priestesses...to claim that Popes Saint John Paul II, and Benedict XVI, had played key roles in having advanced the crisis.
-- The Church's right-wing has tried to link the "crisis" to Vatican II, the Holy Mass of Pope Saint Paul VI..to link the crisis to Popes Saint Paul VI, Saint John Paul II, as well as Francis.
That is why I believe that it is vital to note:
-- That even at the peak of the "crisis," only a microscopic amount of priests were sexual predators.
-- That, at least in certain countries, the "crisis" had peaked decades ago.
Pax.
Mark Thomas
Father McDonald said..."When he speaks about encounter with people in the LGBTQ+++ community, and being inclusive of them, I don’t hear a call for repentance and conversion based upon the teaching so the Risen Lord, His moral teaching and His example."
From the dawn of his Pontificate, Pope Francis has upheld Church teaching in regard to homosexuality.
In 2013 A.D., Pope Francis denounced the Homosexual Lobby.
During that same in-flight press conference, Pope Francis insisted that a person guilty of sin is to seek the Lord, confess, then reform one's life. Then, he noted, that homosexuals, as well of others, who have sought the Lord, and have good will, are in line to receive the Lord's mercy.
Pope Francis has, time and again, promoted the Holy Sacrament of Penance.
Pope Francis has rejected same-sex "marriage."
From the Advocate, 2015 A.D:
"In a move that disappointed LGBT Catholics, Pope Francis this week praised those backing ballot measures in Slovakia that would not only ban same-sex marriage but also prohibit same-sex couples from adopting and allow parents to withdraw their children from sex education classes."
Pope Francis declared while homosexuals are "children of God...That does not mean approving of homosexual acts, not in the least."
Pax.
Mark Thomas
MT, two cardinals extremely close to him, one a Jesuit and head of the synod, are advocating blessings of homosexual unions and changing Scripture and Tradition about these acts. This has implications for overthrowing Humana’s Vitae in its entirety. No slap now or TC type muto proprio from PF. That speaks volumes.?PF today is showing his cards in a developmental sort of way compared to 2013.
Of course the other problem is a failure to understand what the "abuse crisis" really is. While the hierarchy and the media want to keep the focus on the age of a few of the victims, the real issue id active homosexuals in the clergy (all levels) - until that is understood, admitted and addressed, it is all just smoke and mirrors. Placing restrictions on all adults around any minors is exactly that approach to take if you want to distract from the actual problem.
The idea that the crisis peaked decades ago is true only under two conditions: 1) one thinks the crisis is limited to sex with minors; 2) one trusts the authorities (ecclesial and civil) to be vigilant and honest. I see very little reason to accept either condition. We routinely get reports and accusations about active homosexual clergy hiring gay prostitutes or having sex with each other. And, of course, covering up of same. Almost as disturbing is the refusal of almost every bishop to even mention the word homosexual - except to make excuses for it or celebrate it.
It is the culture. Criminals get second, third chances by liberal DAs and judges. Liberal legistlatures write and pass laws that ignore the victim. In the Church sin and its consequences has been soft pedaled. There seems to be a human tendency to favor the powerful (the criminal) and dis-favor the weak (the victim).
The cause of the exploited, (sexually or otherwise), cry to the Heaven according to Judeo-Christian treachings. The secularization of sacred traditon in the Catholi Church, and generally in other Cristian religious communities also, inevitably has led to moral confusion. The sins that cry out to Heaven are being "reformed" in- and outsider the Church. The Great "Crack Up" is well in the makiig. (read George Friedman: The Storm Before the Calm. Not a theologian but worth reading anyway.)
Father McDonald said..."MT, two cardinals extremely close to him, one a Jesuit and head of the synod, are advocating blessings of homosexual unions and changing Scripture and Tradition about these acts. This has implications for overthrowing Humana’s Vitae in its entirety. No slap now or TC type muto proprio from PF. That speaks volumes.?PF today is showing his cards in a developmental sort of way compared to 2013."
Father McDonald, Pope Francis has maintained the Church's teachings in regard to homosexuality.
Father McDonald, your concern with Pope Francis in regard to homosexuality is interesting in that you have praised Cardinal Zuppi...and have insisted that he would make an excellent Pope.
Cardinal Zuppi has acted in line with Pope Francis' approach to homosexuality...even down to having praised Father James Martin's outreach to homosexuals.
Father McDonald, in regard to the issue of homosexuality, you have grated a pass to Cardinal Zuppi, but not to Pope Francis. I do not understand that.
But if we are to believe "traditionalists," then there is one major difference between Pope Francis, and Cardinal Zuppi, in regard to the issue of homosexuality.
"Traditionalists" have claimed that earlier this year, Cardinal Zuppi permitted a priest of the Archdiocese of Bologna to have blessed a same-sex "marriage."
Anyway, Pope Francis has maintained the Church's teachings in regard to homosexuality...even to the point of having rejected the blessing of same-sex marriage that Cardinal Zuppi permitted (supposedly...supposedly).
Pax.
Mark Thomas
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