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	Address the Scourge of Abuse Khaleej Times March 22, 2010 http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/editorial/2010/March/editorial_March44.xml§ion=editorial&col= Dubai -- The crisis in the Catholic Church seems to deepen by the day. And an unprecedented apology by Pope Benedict XVI on Saturday doesn't appear to have made much of a difference to the faithful outraged by growing sexual abuse scandal around the world, the latest to be affected being Ireland. In a strongly worded apology addressed to the Irish faithful but meant for the entire Christian world, Pope has gone out of his way to woo back his flock: "You have suffered grievously and I am truly sorry. I know that nothing can undo the wrong you have endured. Your trust has been betrayed and your dignity has been violated. Many of you found that, when you were courageous enough to speak of what happened to you, no one would listen. It is understandable you find it hard to forgive or be reconciled with the Church. In her name, I express the shame and remorse that we all feel. Benedict used his harshest words for the abusers themselves, saying they had betrayed the trust of the faithful, brought shame on the church and now must answer before God and civil authorities. "Conceal nothing," he exhorted them. "Openly acknowledge your guilt, submit yourselves to the demands of justice, but do not despair of God's mercy." In his short rein, Pope Benedict has distinguished himself by saying 'sorry' more often than any pope in the Catholic Church's long and eventful history: From apologising for his remarks against Islam's Prophet to repenting for serving in Hitler's youth brigade as a teenager, the pontiff has forever been at his apologetic best. In 2008, Benedict apologised to American and Australian Catholic communities for sexual and physical abuse of children at the hands of corrupt priests. However, this is by far the strongest and most candid apology the Pope has offered on behalf of the Church. However, this seems to have cut no ice with Ireland's main group of abuse victims, One in Four, which says it's 'disappointed' by Benedict's apology as it fails to acknowledge the Vatican's responsibility for what it calls a "deliberate policy…at the highest levels to protect sex offenders, thereby endangering children." The group claims if the church cannot acknowledge "this fundamental truth, it is still in denial." The controversy of sexual abuse of children by priests is perhaps as old as the history of clergy itself. But of late these reports of innocent and young impressionable children suffering some of the worst sexual abuses at the hands of 'holy men' have acquired alarming proportions. From America to Australia to Canada and from Germany to Ireland to Austria, this circle of corruption and betrayal seems to forever widen to the utter horror of nearly a billion followers. And Benedict is not the first pontiff to apologise for such abuse. This is why the Vatican and senior Catholic priests representing the largest Christian community in the world, mustn't stop at offering apologies however sincere. They need to address the real, underlying sources and causes of this scourge. Maybe they need to see what could be done to discourage holy men and women, living in celibacy, from preying on young people in their charge. As Cardinal Christoph Schonborn of Vienna has suggested, perhaps the celibacy rule for priests itself needs to be revisited. Whatever the Church eventually proposes, let's hope, it will stamp out and prevent such shameful abuse in future. Mere apologies and forgive-and-forget appeals won't work.
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