BishopAccountability.org
	Pope Aims to Resolve Church Scandals Opelousas Daily World December 23, 2010 http://www.dailyworld.com/article/20101223/OPINION/12230305 The message came late — three decades late — but it was welcome, all the same. On Monday, Pope Benedict XVI told officials at the Vatican they should reflect on child sex abuse scandals involving priests. A series of such scandals has plagued the Roman Catholic Church since the crimes of former priest Gilbert Gauthe in Vermilion Parish surfaced in the early 1980s. This pope's personal history includes advocacy of stern measures to prevent the sexual exploitation of children. His predecessor, Pope John Paul II, was in many ways an extraordinary spiritual leader for the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics — but not where the child abuse scandals are concerned. During his papacy, the church's dealings with sex abuse by priests seemed to vacillate between stonewalling and absolving itself through good works but without real contrition. Sometimes, the church seemed more interested in a quick, relatively inexpensive settlement than in acknowledging its own deficiencies. That's why many whose lives were touched by these abuse cases might find comfort in Benedict's words. After all these years, there's still the sense of vague unease that comes with failing to settle an important issue. In his speech this week, Benedict said secular society must share the blame, and there's truth in that. But it's too easy. Child sex abuse, child pornography and the other evils cited by the pope are aberrations. The troubling part of the church scandals is the church's reaction seemed less like an aberration than a systematic, if ill-conceived, strategy. A considerable body of evidence indicates Gauthe was moved from a Lafayette church after signs of sexual misconduct arose, and then again from a church in Iberia, before he finally wound up in Vermilion. Over the years, we have seen the same pattern in cases scattered around our country and around the world. We hope the reflection urged by Benedict centers on that moment, whenever it was, that responsible church leaders decided the safety of children entrusted to their care was less important than the church's good name or its financial bottom line. The intentions might even have been good. Hushing up the scandals might have seemed the best way to guard the church's ability to fulfill its spiritual and earthly duties. But when we choose the lesser of two evils, we often end up with both. In the end, the church didn't protect the children or its good standing. We hope Benedict's admonition will move the church closer to complete resolution of these scandals so it can perform its mission of good works unhindered.
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