Mark Ruffalo Urges Pope to Use His New Film to Heal Sex Abuse Victims
By Andrew Pulver
Actor Mark Ruffalo issued a dramatic plea to the pope to use the new film Spotlight, which chronicles the investigation into widespread clerical sexual abuse in Boston, to “begin to heal the wounds sustained not just by the survivors, but all the people that lost their faith because of the revelations”. Ruffalo was speaking to journalists at the world premiere of Spotlight at the Venice film festival, and directly addressed Pope Francis. “I hope the Vatican will use this movie to begin to right those wrongs: not just for the victims and their destroyed lives, but for all the people who have lost their way to order a chaotic world for themselves. We are hoping the pope will use this sober and, I believe, judicious story to begin to healing the wounds the church also received.” However, Spotlight’s director Tom McCarthy said he was not hopeful that there would be any meaningful change within the Catholic church. “I remain pessimistic. I was raised Catholic - but words are one thing, actions are another. I have high hopes for Francis, but what actually changes remains to be seen. To be honest, I expect no reaction at all. Nothing would make me happier to be proven wrong. I would love the pope, the cardinals and bishops and priests to see it. I don’t think anyone can think this is an attack on the church: everything in the movie has been well reported on and documented.”
Spotlight examines in detail the journalistic investigation by the Boston Globe’s Spotlight team into accusations of child abuse by scores of Roman Catholic priests and the subsequent cover-up by the church hierarchy, including Boston’s archbishop, Cardinal Law. The Globe’s series of articles, published in 2002, went on to win the Pulitzer prize and triggered a series of prosecutions of priests for sexual offences, many against children, committed throughout the 1980s and 90s. Law resigned as archbishop in 2002 (though remained a cardinal) and the church was revealed to have knowingly allowed priests who had abused children to remain working, as well as having any knowledge of their crimes suppressed. McCarthy said: “Many of the survivors of the abuse spoke about the dual betrayal – physical abuse and spiritual abuse – and as a result felt they had nowhere to turn. Religion counted for a lot for them, and without the community support they felt completely lost. As we know, this didn’t end well for many of them. When you think about it all in that way, you realise how diabolical this crime was.” The film also highlights a practice of long-term investigative reporting that in McCarthy’s words, has been “decimated” in the digital era. “I’m not sure the general public understands how dire the situation is, and how important a strong free press is to democracy.” Ruffalo, who has a long track record of political activism, said that he was more optimistic about the future of information reporting. “The news media lost of lot of credibility over the Iraq war, and since then a lot of investigative people moved online. We now have a lot more information than during the old centralised model. Investigative reporters now are a lot freer that they used to be, without editors. Blogs like ProPublica are not beholden to anyone; it is a great time.” McCarthy, in contrast, said that the decline of regional media was a serious problem. “We still need boots on the ground, reporters in court, at the police station. That is the disconnect right now, as the manpower has gone down. Someone said to me, now is a great time to be in local corruption, because there’s no one looking. We don’t appreciate what we’ve already lost.” Spotlight is released in the US on 6 November, and in the UK on 29 January.
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