Church’s days of atonement

The Australian
March 17, 2015

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/editorials/churchs-days-of-atonement/story-e6frg71x-1227266991892

LIKE all citizens charged with a crime, the Catholic Archbishop of Adelaide, Philip Wilson, 64, is innocent unless he is found guilty. He was charged yesterday with concealing child sex abuse by another priest in the 1970s. Appropriately, the Archbishop has taken indefinite leave. He has promised to “vigorously defend my innocence” against the charge of concealing a serious indictable offence. If convicted, he could face two years’ jail.

The decision by NSW Police to charge the Archbishop, first revealed by The Australian online yesterday, is a further sign that after years of inaction, bungling and cover-ups, the wheels of justice are turning for victims of sex abuse in Australia. Case by case, testimony by testimony, the NSW Special Commission of Inquiry and the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse have dug deep to uncover the ugly truth.

For 20 years, the moral authority of Christian and other churches has been torn asunder by revelations of abuse by priests and others in privileged positions of trust, and by the cover-ups of church authorities. The problem also extends far beyond churches, of course, to schools, state orphanages, sports clubs and foster homes. Many cases, sadly, occur within families.

Archbishop Wilson’s predicament will not help the church’s credibility. He is understood to be the most senior Catholic official worldwide to face such a charge, although several bishops have been accused of similar conduct. The Archbishop is vice-president of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, a body he previously led as president for six years. Before his promotion to Adelaide in 2001 he was bishop of Wollongong and, earlier, vicar-general of the Maitland-Newcastle diocese. It was a problematic diocese for decades and a dangerous place for vulnerable children. Numerous cases of abuse by priests have emerged. In August 2012, another former vicar-general, Tom Brennan, became the first Australian Catholic priest charged with concealing child abuse committed by another. Brennan died before he faced trial.