BishopAccountability.org
	Addressing a Scandal Toledo Blade April 24, 2008 http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080424/OPINION02/804240306/-1/OPINION BY FAR the most significant feature of Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the United States was his meeting in Washington with a half-dozen victims of sexual abuse by clerics. The private session, in which the Pope voiced deep shame over the long-running abuse, gave hope to some American Catholics that the devastating scandal would be more forcefully addressed. Still, the distance between papal acknowledgement of the problem and real action by the church hierarchy could be lengthy. As recent local events have suggested, the church still has a long way to go in restoring trust in its ministry. The revelation that a Catholic priest in the Toledo diocese, now under investigation by Sylvania Township police on charges of sexual assault, also was arrested nearly 10 years ago for public indecency, is highly disturbing. So is the discovery that another area priest, currently leading a diocesan parish, was likewise arrested about the same time, also for public indecency. But the records in those cases both were sealed. Every allegation or confirmed development concerning the sexual misconduct of priests reopens a deep wound in American Catholicism that Pope Benedict inherited when he assumed the papacy three years ago. It stirs suspicion that church leaders remain more interested in protecting their own than the flock they serve. To that end, the Pope's face-to-face meeting with abuse victims, during his first visit to the United States as head of the Roman Catholic Church, may herald an important change in the way the church handles this scourge in the future. The victims later said they felt comforted by Benedict, who seemed receptive to their message about the strong need for redemptive action. The church's standing has been badly damaged by what one survivor of clerical abuse called "a cancer" growing in the ministry. But the chief pastor of this country's 65 million Catholics raised fresh expectations of healing and "not losing heart in the face of adversity, resistance, and scandal" before he returned to the Vatican. If the Pontiff's repeated references about the scandal lead to a new direction of accountability and authority in the church, his brief trip here will be regarded as a definite step forward for American Catholics.
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