Posted on 01/05/2003 12:13:45 PM PST by Incorrigible
Sunday, January 05, 2003
BY RAYMOND A. SCHROTH, S.J.
Associated Press
[Jersey City, NJ] -- A year ago tomorrow the Boston Globe started publishing articles on the Catholic church's sexual abuse scandal, which sent the Boston diocese into a tailspin and had a ripple effect throughout the country.
A few weeks ago, a coalition of the courts, the press, the people, and the parish priests toppled Cardinal Bernard F. Law. It was sad to see his fall; but it is tragic that some bishops, like Law, have carried themselves less as servants than as princes on thrones.
How should the story of this scandal best be told -- and what kind of writer should tell it?
1. The writer should start by describing what happened in the church at the end of the 19th century: Rather than modeling the growing American church on the structures of democracy, the hierarchy -- more political than pastoral -- set the patterns of institutional behavior that remain today, especially patterns of secrecy.
Next, the writer should move to 1983, to Lafayette, La., where a group of families told their bishop a priest had molested their children. Within 20 years this scandal, repeated throughout the country, became the battleground on which progressive and conservative Catholics fought for their vision of the church's future.
The conservatives have seen the sexual acting-out reflected in the current scandal as the natural outcome of Vatican II's opening the windows to modernity, letting Marx, Darwin and, above all, Freud blow in.
The advantage of Thomistic moral philosophy, taught in Catholic colleges until the 1960s, was its moral clarity. The social sciences were the camel's head in the tent, conservatives say, introducing ambiguity, a watered- down sense of personal responsibility, and an implied invitation to experiment, even for vowed religious. In their periodicals, conservatives today argue that homosexuals have taken over the seminaries and corrupted the church's morals and doctrines.
Progressive Catholics, on the other hand, attribute the scandal to the clerical culture: Bishops are chosen only on the basis of their doctrinal purity. This means they are, with few exceptions, company men devoid of courage and imagination.
For progressives, the scandal has revealed the cracks in a system of forced celibacy and the exclusion of women from the priesthood. Married bishops with children would not brush off reports of priests who molested children. Women priests would break up the all-male club in the clerical power structure. The issue of gay priests, they say, is a red herring. Gays can be as chaste and pastorally effective as straights, they argue.
2. Ideally, the book should be written by a Catholic scholar, or, at least, by a theologically sophisticated non-Catholic believer. A number of "lapsed," "raised," "collapsed," and other species of angry-ex-Catholics have used the op-ed pages to settle scores with Sister or Father So-and-So who rapped their knuckles in grammar school. This book calls for a surgeon with a scalpel rather than an executioner with an ax.
3. The writer should get the facts on the sexual behavior of celibates.
I have read of widespread clergy concubinage in Africa and Latin America; but I had long assumed that the overwhelming majority of American priests were both heterosexual and faithful to their vows. Now I read that perhaps half of those entering in recent decades are homosexual and that an alarming number of both gay and straight priests lead double lives. This may or may not be true. The writer needs to find out.
He or she also should consider the possibility that innocent priests have been accused, fired and sent to prison. Good priests, on the basis of a single ambiguous accusation, have been sidelined for the rest of their lives.
4. Many clerical-abuse victims have been willing to testify about their pain. But the writer's challenge will be to get inside the mind of the abuser.
The Rev. Donald Cozzens, author of "The Changing Face of the Priesthood," has chillingly described serial offenders as sociopaths, without remorse. Inevitably there will be chapters on the monster molesters -- like Boston's John Geogan and Paul Shanley -- whose relentless pursuit of vulnerable youths marks them more as moral freaks than as representative figures.
But the greater mystery involves not the pedophiles and serial offenders, who constitute a minority, but apparently successful priests, admired by their flocks, who crossed the line in their relationships with young people -- some only once -- and repented long ago. Even once is too often, but how could this one time have been prevented? What went wrong?
Were such priests just not immune to the virus of a sexually absorbed American popular culture? Did they lack the maturity to integrate their spirituality, work, natural tenderness and need for affection?
5. The writer will understand that villains will emerge, but heroes will be harder to spot.
During the scandal's early stages, victims, parents, lawyers and journalists raised hell; the final surge brought forth the Voice of the Faithful and their priest supporters. But sex, money and power all corrupt. Some priests claim their accusers are motivated by money; some accusations have been found to be false. It will take a wise author to sort out the truth in disputed cases.
Cardinal Law and his coterie of auxiliaries who were promoted to other dioceses are characters made if not for Shakespeare, at least for Arthur Miller -- climbers loyal to a system that had moved them to the previous rung on the ladder and would move them to the next. Each bishop perhaps was tantalized by the same demon that sits on the shoulder of every ambitious cleric: You too could be pope!
They saw the church as a secret society, not answerable to parishioners, the public or the press. Now the laws of an open society have exposed them.
Meanwhile the writer must discover the untold story -- which I read in letters and e-mail messages from all over the country -- of the alienation between bishops and good priests who once kissed their bishops' hands at ordination and now feel betrayed.
6. Finally, this book must speculate on the future of the church.
The American bishops may imagine that they can restore the status quo. Perhaps. This pope will soon pass away. The writer of this book, unlike church authorities, must listen to an international cross-section of theologians and pastors for a grassroots view on what the church should be. A startling picture will emerge. The American scandal has been a match to the fire, and the wind will carry the smoke across the world.
Raymond A. Schroth, S.J., Jesuit Community Professor at St. Peter's College, is author of "Fordham: A History and Memoir" (Loyola Press). His e-mail address is raymondschroth@aol.com.
Not for commercial use. For educational and discussion purposes only.
At least he described the conservative and "progressive" positions pretty well. He is, of course, a "progressive" who spoke to Voice of the Faithful about women priests. (Voice of the Faithful draws curious to Morris church)
Those of you who are Catholic may not hold with some of the doctrines and practices of the ECUSA, but you hear of very few ECUSA priests accused of child abuse or molestation.
Episcopalians still championing gay rights
EPISCOPALIANS TO DEBATE RESOLUTION ASKING MEMBERS TO GIVE UP THEIR WEAPONS
New Episcopal bishop voices liberal views
Episcopal Rector Suspended (Opposes Ordination of Women, Gays)
Cherokee Episcopal priestess set to become bishop [my title, complete w/barf alert]
Schism Opens in Episcopal Church.
Churches and Priests Leaving Episcopal Denomination in Increasing Numbers
The Orthodox do not "allow priests to marry". They ordain married men. There's a significant difference.
Those of you who are Catholic may not hold with some of the doctrines and practices of the ECUSA, but you hear of very few ECUSA priests accused of child abuse or molestation.
Someone else will have do the research. Suffice it to say that they have a significant problem on their hands, as well. Attend to the plank in your own eye.
Schroth later said some topics, such as ordination of women, are too hot right now for serious discussion. He added that he expects it to happen when people want it to happen."Women, I suspect, will be ordained only after the church has experimented more with married clergy," Schroth told the audience.
It looks like Fr. Schroth has forgotten (?) his basic theology. It ain't gonna happen because it is not in God's plan. Sheesh. Why doesn't he do the honorable thing and leave the Church?
So if someone is ordained while single, they are not allowed to marry? Thanks. I was unaware of this.
Someone else will have do the research. Suffice it to say that they have a significant problem on their hands, as well. Attend to the plank in your own eye.
A significant problem with what? Child abuse? Sorry, if you're going to make that allegation you'll have to do the research and present it yourself to be credible.
All denominations have problems with pederasty, as do all school districts and any other venue in which adults have close contact with young people.
The reason the Catholic Church has such a problem is the clericalism, which encourages bishops to protect priests, no matter what.
Yes, the Catholic Church would be infinitely better off if priests, and lay people, had some say in the selection of bishops. Yes, the Catholic Church would be better off if the priesthood were open to married men, starting with the men who left the priesthood to marry and the permananent deacons who might feel called to the priesthood. Then, allow any married man of sufficient probity to petition the Church for ordination.
Celibacy provides witness value only for those called to it, and there are not many men called to it, priests included. I can relate stories of friends of mine who have been priests for years who have to fight to remain celibate, to not give in to the yearning for the companionship of a woman (it's NOT about sex!)
I'm not tempted to adultery, and never have been. But, I had to struggle with celibacy for the entire seven years I was in the seminary.
As a Catholic , I propose that you do some research before trying to pass yourself off as an expert on the discipline of celibacy and it's history, because you aren't. The discipline of celibacy dates back to the Apostles. As for the Orthodox Church, married men may be ordained but once ordained, priests may not then marry and all bishops are chosen exclusively from celibate priests.
There it is in a nutshell.
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