The next time you read an account of an abuse scandal affecting priests, note the time frame in which the acts allegedly occurred. Almost certainly, it will date from long ago, probably 30 years or more. Why is that? Typically, an individual sues a church over abuse that he suffered in his childhood, and in the Catholic context, he might well find written evidence to confirm his charges of misconduct long ago. He is, after all, dealing with an institution that prizes its collective memory and preserves records dating back centuries. The victim can not only find embarrassing information about Father John Doe, but his lawyers also then can force a diocese to disclose ever more information about ancient charges against other priests, which can lead into other jurisdictions. One case thus becomes the basis for a whole network of interlocking investigations. Perhaps it’s good that such older abuse cases are still coming to light, but the long passage of time makes it very unlikely that the charges can be investigated in a fair or reliable way.
Nor does the plaintiff in a civil case have to meet the high standards of a criminal case, of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. He just has to convince a jury that his allegations are more probably true than not. Most civil cases involving priestly abuse go forward on the basis of evidence that would not stand up in a criminal court. Often, dioceses settle dubious cases to avoid expensive legal proceedings, but such closure can be a mixed blessing. Whatever the merits of the particular case, critics take the fact of settling to suggest that the church is paying blood money to conceal its crimes. That’s not just a church problem. Celebrities and corporations face the same problem, that the public does not understand the workings of litigation.
As the resulting Catholic horror stories accumulate, so many media organizations develop a ready-made format for reporting them, a familiar mythology of specifically Catholic malpractice. Saying that does not mean charging any particular news outlet with deliberate religious prejudice: Some go to great lengths to be fair to accused clergy. But when we approach the issue as a specifically Catholic one, we inevitably cast the church as villain, to the exclusion ofother interpretations. The more firmly the public accepts the image of the sinister priest, the harder it becomes to find juries who will disbelieve abuse allegations. The more cases are reported, the more people come forward to publicize their own complaints. Most plaintiffs are reporting genuine victimization, but some are not.
An intriguing article, more for the implicit questions it raises. It
mentions that abuse can and does occur in other contexts, such
as secular schools. What about within other professions such as
medicine and dentistry, where sexual abuse of minors has sometimes
occurred ? If available information indicates that some secular
professions have higher rates of sexual abuse than RC clergy, one
must then inquire why the media so eagerly report egregious
clerical failings but shy away from reporting such abuse
among secular professions.
With all due respect to Jenkins, this is not a good rhetorical strategy: “We don’t know for sure, but it is possible that other institutions are just as depraved and heinous as we are. We’re just getting picked on.” Does the fact that you self-advertise as one [u]holy[/u], catholic, [u]church[/u] not reduce to utter shame the argument that “some secular institutions might be just as evil we are”?
Furthermore, it also ignores the actual source of outrage — not just that these things happened (whether recently or “30 years ago”), but that they were tolerated and covered up by leaders of that very holy community which understands itself in ontological union and moral continuity with the Christ of God.
I believe Philip Jenkins is an Episcopalian, so he is not coming from this as a Roman Catholic. I have heard that if the public knew the amount of sexual abuse students suffered at the hands of public school teachers, they would be outraged, but that dilemma is ignored by the media. But I agree with Occasional Reader, the Catholic Church has a greater call than a secular institution for correct and loving behavior, and they certainly neglected this when they tried to downplay their responsibilities for the abuse.
For most of my career, I provided legal representation to public school districts. During the late 70’s-early 80’s there was a rash of cases involving sexual abuse of students by teachers. There was also a tendency to cover up by transfering the offending teacher to another district. Laws in the state of Washington were changed and most of the bad eggs were forced out. There was definitely something about that period of time that encouraged this conduct.
#2 You are quite right in your condemnation of abuse and the subsequent cover-up in the RC Church. It is a profoundly evil pox on that institution and the RC Church can and should make amends as best they can. I believe they are starting to do that.
Even with that being said, it’s perfectly appropriate to wonder about and question the motives of the media in their reporting of this situation. There are many molestations in public schools of children by teachers yet the media doesn’t focus on that. There are doctors taking advantage of patients while they are under sedation, or therapists who take advantage of a patients trusting relationship and sleep with patients. This also garners very little coverage.
The media also mis-reports the situation in 3 key ways. First, they report the abuse (especially in headlines) with an inference that the abuse is happening now, or has happened recently even though most of these cases go back to the 60’s and 70’s. Second, they blame “conservative Vatican leaders” when 30 years or so ago, moderates to liberals held more sway after Vatican II. Third, they report the situation as pedophilia (children) when in actuality most cases are of pederasty(teens with developed secondary sexual characteristics), and the vast majority of these cases involve homosexual acts. Pederasty is just as repulsive as pedophilia, but one would not be out of line to wonder why the teen homosexual connection is almost never looked at in what must be thousands of media stories that exist about the abuse.
None of the above excuses the horrible betrayal of trust between priest and child or teen parishoner. I cannot imagine the anger the Lord must have to see his ministers abuse the very children that He admonished His disciples to allow them to come unto Him. That being said, one still has the right to question the motives or possible agenda of the institutions doing the reporting. There are reasons for the widespread mis-reporting and sensationalism that the media give this scandal- and that reason is to destroy not just the RC Church, but to destroy Christianity as well.
I remember reading several years ago (and I wish I could remember where) that the same percentage of people are guilty of sexual abuse across the professional spectrum – about 2% of clergy, doctors, lawyer, teachers, etc take advantage of their parishioners, patients, clients, students, etc. Of course, in many cases the behavior is between adults. The fall-out from adult-adult misconduct is not as devastating as from adult-child or adult-youth – but it is devastating nonetheless in a great many instances.
The trouble for the Church is that we have a particular set of high standards, and a goal of helping “the least, the lost, and the lonely.” We aim to be of service to the vulnerable – which means that we can harm the vulnerable, contrary to our stated goals. It is a matter of great sorrow that some pastors, youth leaders, etc, take advantage of those under their care.
But pastors are not alone. We have company, which is both a comfort and a sorrow.
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Branford–you are right –he is Episcopalian. I saw him speak at Gordon College in Ma. Afterwards I asked him what religion he was since he was speaking in an Evangelical College, but sounded so very Catholic.
Thank God the Catholic Church IS held to a higher standard and is expected to live up to the Christian moral tradition in every respect.
But to hear the media claim they are not biased in the way they have used every resource available to probe the Church, but ignored doing any serious probing of the public schools is a bit much.
Especially since the academic research on the public schools indicates there is far more abuse there based on the much huger number of young people in the public schools as well as per professional persons.
The NY Times a number of years ago admitted this was the case in ONE front page article. They said the schools called it “moving the trash along” when they quietly transferred (without notification) the bad apples to other school systems.
Jenkins was a Welsh Anglican who became a Catholic and married an English Catholic girl while he was a research student at Cambridge. He co-authored the book *Catholic Cambridge* with the then Catholic Chaplain to Cambridge University, Maurice Couve de Murville (1929-2007), who became Archbishop of Birmingham in 1982. In an interview conducted by David Virtue some years ago Jenkins stated that he and his wife became Episcopalians shortly after he came to America in 1980 to take up a faculty position at Penn State University, giving as his reason that they found the worship of their local Episcopalian parish more congenial than that of local Catholic ones.