Clergy Sexual Abuse and the Church Today: Turning Talk into Action

By Thomas P. Doyle
Voice of the Faithfu
April 5, 2014

http://www.votf.org/2014Assembly/2014AssemblyTomDoyleWorkshopPresentation.pdf

[full text]

Where the Institutional Church is Today

Sources of information: media reports, official church statements, court records, official and private reports, information from victims, bishops statements, bishops’ actions

1. The so-called sex abuse “crisis” or “scandal” is thirty years old this year. My authority for any conclusions or opinions I offer rests partially on the fact that I have been directly involved for all of those thirty years. I will admit today that in the summer of 1985 and the winter of 1985 I would not have been able to imagine what would unfold in the following decades. I certainly had no idea of the impact my own experience would have on my relationship to the institutional Church, to my belief system and to my concept of the Higher Power.

2. Before considering the transition from discussion to action, it is essential to consider the foundation for action and the reasons why it is essential to the life and growth of the Church. By “Church” I do not mean the very limited institutional dimension but the far more dynamic reality, the People of God.

3. The past three decades have revealed much about clergy sexual abuse but even more important, they have revealed much about the institutional Catholic Church and the tension between it and the Body of Christ.

a. Sex abuse of minors by clerics of all ranks is an historical constant. There is sexual abuse of minors by clerics in every geographic area where the church exists.

b. The extent of revelations of sex abuse has been commensurate with the willingness of victims to seek relief in the civil courts and in the capacity and willingness of the courts to respond to the victims with objectivity.

c. Sex abuse has been actively denied and covered up by bishops, religious superiors and popes since the early 19th century. The bishops’ negative and inadequate response to reports of abuse and to suspected abusers has been uniform and consistent throughout the international scope of the Church.

d. The institutional Church as a whole and bishops in general, including the bishops of Rome, have never given any credible indication that they understood the nature and gravity of the spiritual damage done to victims.

e. Likewise the Church and bishops in general have given no credible evidence to date of an ability and willingness to make the pastoral welfare, i.e., compassionate care and support, the priority in their response.

f. Bishops remain on the defensive. Their responses have been administrative and bureaucratic. The bishops in the U.S. have expended significant monetary and human resources on programs and policies to protect children in the future.

g. No effort by any diocese has been proactive or initiated independent of pressure from the media, the courts and angry laypersons. In other words, all of the programs and other “advances” referenced by bishops and by Pope Francis have been forced on the institutional Church since the public revelations and nearly all have been instituted since 2002.

h. Attorneys for the institutional Church continue to exert great influence over bishops. Victims are treated with disdain if they decide to resort to the civil courts for justice and recognition. Some examples: Los Angeles, Milwaukee, Kansas City, Philadelphia, St. Paul, and Denver.

i. The archetype of revictimization and institutional abuse is George Pell formerly of Sydney.

j. There are few known examples of bishops who have exhibited sincere pastoral concern for victims. Perfunctory visits at the bishop’s office and penitential liturgies are not examples of pastoral concern.