Ratzinger Asked for Discussion of Clerical Celibacy

in Celibacy, Pope Benedict 30 Comments Tags: ,

According to the Suddeutsche Zeitung, in 1970 several theologians wrote to the German Bishops asking that the requirement that all priests in the Latin Church to be celibate be discussed. Among the theologians were Karl Rahner, Walter Kasper, Karl Lehman – and Joseph Ratzinger, currently Pope Benedict XVI. This letter was quietly and discretely filed away and was recently leaked to a reform group in Regensburg.

 

They wrote that they did not desire to prejudice the decision of the Church, but that they thought that the  long-standing tradition of clerical celibacy should be reconsidered in the light of modern historical and social conditions “neuen geschichtlichen und gesellschaftlichen Situationen,” such as the ever-increasing lack of priests, “dieses akuter werdenden Priestermangels.” They also pointed to the Eastern Catholic churches, which ordain married men.

 

In particular, they wondered whether such a requirement of celibacy was prudent in the overheated sexual atmosphere of the modern world. They questioned the formation of priests. If a candidate said he had no problem with celibacy, did he really know his own desires? They also thought it important to consider  “the psychological instability of many young men in today’s sexually overwrought society,” “die psychische Labilität vieler junger Menschen in der heutigen sexuell überreizten Gesellschaft.”

 

The signers indicated that celibacy was closely connected to the priesthood, but that refusing to discuss the current discipline seemed to show more faith in the power of formal authority “an die Macht einer formalen Autorität” than in the power of the recommendation of celibacy in the Gospel “die Kraft der evangelischen Empfehlung des ehelosen Lebens  um des Himmelreiches willen.”

 

Ratzinger has changed his mind  over certain issues over the course of his lifetime – this is neither surprising nor dishonest. However, he should explain how he went from point A to point B, especially to those who are at point A.

 

Celibacy, like fidelity in marriage, is difficult for men. Male sexuality is unruly, and always ha been. However, the situation in the modern world may make celibacy almost impossible for men who are otherwise good candidates for the priesthood. The omnipresence of Internet pornography and the availability of contraception have perhaps permanent changed the sexual milieu which young men develop.

 

In his epistles Paul goes back and forth between recommending celibacy for the unmarried and widowed and thinking that, since the world is not going to end immediately, it would be better for people to marry and for the married to abstain from relations at most for a time, lest they be tempted.

 

The Eastern Churches have married clergy, and despite all Vatican protestations to the contrary the Eastern Churches are second-class members of the universal Catholic church. They are not allowed to ordain married men in countries where the Latin rite predominates. Their patriarchs rank behind cardinals and do not vote in papal elections. And there are many other such slights which indicate that the Eastern Churches are tolerated rather than treasured.

 

The pope should not change the disciple of celibacy on his own – he should consult with the bishops of the world. Even if Benedict thinks it might be a wise idea to sometimes ordain married men, he may hesitate for two reasons:

 

First, once the disciple of celibacy was abandoned, it would be almost impossible to reinstate it if it turned out that, for all its problems, celibacy indeed provided a spiritual dynamism to the clergy of the Latin Church.

 

Second, if the discipline of celibacy were abandoned, it would raise expectations of changes in other matters which are far more serious, such as the ordination of women.

 

So I suspect Benedict will do nothing and let the next pope handle the problem. The next pope will also do nothing, and so on. Perhaps the Third Vatican Council will take it up in 2300.

 

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Canon Law and Sexual Abuse

in clergy sex abuse scandal, Pope Benedict, Pope John Paul II 14 Comments Tags: , , , ,

Nicholas Cafardi has reviewed in Commonweal the muddled history of the canonical handling of abuse cases. He answers a few questions, but he says many more can be answered only by the Vatican, which has not learned to be transparent: 

What we do know is that eventually a few curial officials came to understand the insufficiency of official responses to the scandal—and many more couldn’t or wouldn’t grasp its magnitude. Some bishops and their canonical advisers were flummoxed by the new Code; others looked the other way. The Ratzinger who in 1988 sought a speedier canonical process for handling abusive priests delayed decisions to remove them later. The same man who as a cardinal refused financial gifts from the Legion of Christ as pope allowed the order’s abusive founder Fr. Marcial Maciel to fade into a life of prayer and penance. By all accounts, Ratzinger’s awareness of the sexual-abuse crisis evolved over time, not always in a straight line, and often in conflict with other curial officials. Evidently Cardinal Angelo Sodano, John Paul’s powerful secretary of state, worked hard to frustrate investigations into the sexual abuse perpetrated by Maciel. We may never know whether or how Ratzinger fought to break Sodano’s blockade. Likewise, it seems improbable that we will ever know the full story of Ratzinger’s role in the reassignment of an abusive priest during his tenure as archbishop of Munich. The various currents of power in Rome can be overwhelming—even for a pope.

 So we have to continue to try to connect the dots. The resulting picture may in fact be less flattering to the Church (e.g., malice and corruption) than the reality (e.g., dilatoriness and incompetence) – but no one knows, and no one  may ever know.

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Letter to Vatican about Maciel’s Victoms

in clergy sex abuse scandal, Maciel, Vatican 5 Comments Tags: , , , ,

Apparently someone in trying to block access to this letter which El Milenio posted on the internet. I copy it here for the record. It should certainly be taken into account in the process of Pope John Paul II.

 

Soy el sacerdote defensor de los ex miembros de la institución llamada “Legión de Cristo”, que en su juventud sufrieron graves y repetidas agresiones sexuales de parte del padre Marcial Maciel Degollado L.C. Aceptar el encargo, partiendo del principio evangélico veritas liberabit vos, ha supuesto para un servidor incomprensión y persecución.

 

milenio Redacción

 

A Su Excelencia Mons. Stanislaw Dziwisz
Palazzo Apostolico
Citta del Vaticano

1. Soy el sacerdote defensor de los ex miembros de la institución llamada “Legión de Cristo”, que en su juventud sufrieron graves y repetidas agresiones sexuales de parte del padre Marcial Maciel Degollado L.C. Aceptar el encargo, partiendo del principio evangélico veritas liberabit vos, ha supuesto para un servidor incomprensión y persecución.

2. En nombre de tales personas, he tratado de hacer todo lo posible para obtener justicia en el foro eclesiástico de la Congregación para la Doctrina de la Fe y, eventualmente, en el arzobispado de México. Para su defensa, he exigido siempre que sea preferido el normal ejercicio de la justicia en vez del escándalo innecesario y perjudicial.

3. Es cierto que, en su búsqueda de justicia, antes de que un servidor se encargara de su legítima defensa, ellos han podido cometer algunos explicables errores: publicar, por ejemplo, en un semanario una carta dirigida al Papa, antes de que ella llegara a sus manos, o recurrido a medios audiovisuales al constatar la ambigüedad de las respuestas recibidas de algunos eclesiásticos.

4. Pero hay que tener en cuenta que los graves abusos sexuales de que fueron objeto en su juventud han marcado a algunos de ellos para siempre. La mayoría ha luchado y lucha por conservar la fe.

5. Ya que el padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C., además de “amigo y confidente del Papa y de sus más inmediatos colaboradores”, pretende ser inocente, ellos aceptan —e incluso desean— que él u otras instancias eclesiales los denuncien ante tribunales eclesiásticos y civiles. Están en efecto dispuestos a presentarse a responder de sus actos en ambos foros.

6. Aman y respetan la persona del Romano Pontífice, Juan Pablo II. No comprenden cómo las instancias que ejercen la justicia en su nombre sigan haciendo caso omiso de sus reiterados recursos legales. No prefieren ruido mediático ni escándalos. Buscan justicia y en la Iglesia ven a una Madre, carente de miedo —como Juan Pablo II— al momento de pedir perdón a quien haya que pedir perdón por algo. Mis clientes no quieren perseguir a la Iglesia. Sólo quieren que el padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C. se someta, como todo fiel católico, a los imperativos de la justicia eclesial.

7. No quieren, sobre todo, que el silencio de la Curia Romana y del arzobispado de México repercuta negativamente en el juicio que la historia pueda hacer de un papa tan grande como el actual. Todavía es tiempo de un gesto pontificio como el tenido el último Jueves Santo con Mons. Juliusz Paetz, arzobispo emérito de Poznan. Las faltas cometidas por el P. Marcial Maciel Degollado L.C., son, por lo menos, más numerosas y, quizás, más graves. Uno de los actos pecaminosos cometidos con uno de los ex seminaristas demandantes tuvo lugar un Sábado Santo. Otro hubo de “ayudar” al padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C., más de cuarenta veces a satisfacer sus bajas pasiones.

8. Ante el pertinaz silencio de los tribunales eclesiásticos, mis defendidos han iniciado contactos oficiosos con un órgano internacional competente en materia de Derechos Humanos.

9. Por consejo mío, antes de redactar oficialmente una denuncia formal ante dicho órgano, ruegan respetuosa y confiadamente por mi medio que Vuestra Señoría solicite a Su Santidad la inmediata designación de una persona independiente y de alto prestigio, incapaz de ser manipulada por el padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C., y sus “amigos romanos”. Dado el buen éxito de sus gestiones, aunque no la conocen, si pudiera expresarse en español o en inglés, consideran que esa persona podría ser la misma que esclareció el “asunto de Poznan, o, por lo menos, de un perfil muy parecido al de un Auditor polaco de la Rota Romana, que, según parece, es el que investigó con éxito dicho caso.

10. Monseñor: el asunto se está haciendo cada día más serio. No es ocultando la verdad como las cosas encuentran justa solución. Han sido proferidas amenazas de muerte y/o agresión física por parte del mismo padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C., y de amigos suyos, contra algunas personas por el hecho de haber defendido y mostrado solidaridad con mis patrocinados. No ignoran que en la Curia Romana hay Cardenales y Prelados que utilizan notoriamente automóviles u otros objetos de valor regalados, o hechos regalar, por el padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C.

11. Si V.E. lo desea, yo estoy dispuesto a encontrarle o encontrar a un encargado suyo, eclesiástico o civil, a quien expondría con todo detalle el grave asunto. Por la repercusión sobre el Santo Padre, de quien el padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C., se proclama amigo y consejero, y de V.E. y del Cardenal Secretario de Estado. Este asunto puede ser mucho más grave que el de los “sacerdotes americanos acusados —verdadera o falsamente— de pederastia”.

12. Si, en su benevolencia, se digna prestar a esta carta la atención que espero y desea recabar unas primeras impresiones sobre mi persona y el asunto que —como último recurso— me permito exponerle, consulte a cualquiera de los tres últimos Presidentes de la Conferencia Episcopal Mexicana o a Prelados a ellos cercanos o afines, y no a uno de aquellos que, junto con el ex Nuncio Apostólico Mons. Gerolamo Prigione constituyen el grupo conocido como “Club de Roma”, todos ellos estrechamente vinculados y protectores del padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C.

Adjunto un breve y sintético resumen de los hechos que tienen por protagonistas al padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C., y a cada uno de mis clientes. El documento va acompañado de una referencia de los pasos dados por un servidor desde que acepté hacerme cargo de su defensa en tribunales eclesiales.

I.

1. Acompañé a los profesores Arturo Jurado Guzmán y José de Jesús Barba Martín, mandatario0s legales del grupo demandante, a presentar el caso ante el R.P. Gianfranco Girotti, subsecretario de la Sagrada Congregación para la doctrina de la Fe, el sábado 17 de Octubre de 1998.

2. La demanda en latín fue presentada oficialmente a la Sagrada Congregación para la doctrina de la Fe el 18 de Febrero de 1999.

3. Con fecha 24 de Diciembre de 1999, mis defendidos recibieron una respuesta, interpósita persona, del padre Gianfranco Girotti, comunicando que la causa “pro nunc” quedaba suspendida, sin ninguna explicación.

4. El día 9 de Septiembre, se entregó a la doctora Martha Wegan, una carta mía, como canonista, de fecha 2 de Marzo de 2000 y dirigida al padre Gianfranco Girotti, insistiéndole en que el Derecho Canónico obligta a ambas partes. Tal misiva mía nunca ha tenido respuesta ni directa ni indirecta.

II. Mis defendidos fueron objeto de abusos sexuales múltiples durante su última niñez, adolescencia y juventud dentro de la institución denominada “Legión de Cristo”. Además de tales abusos, fueron objeto de abusos de diversa índole y fueron testigos de gravísimos actos de conducta contra diversos aspectos de la moral humana y religiosa. Pasados los años y después de acercarse a sacerdotes de prestigio y a varias personas de la jerarquía, ante la indiferencia o silencio observados sobre el caso, se dirigieron a diversos medios de comunicación pública. Finalmente presentaron el casoformalmente de acuerdo al Derecho Canónico ante la congregación correspondiente, la cual hasta la fecha no ha dado ninguna respuesta a mis defendidos sino silencio sin explicación alguna. Disponemos de algunos documentos indirectos probatorios.

Mis defendidos poseen también testimonios y pruebas de falsificaciones muy graves de documentos por parte del padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C., y de subordinados suyos. Algunas de estas falsificaciones han sido atribuidas a altos miembros de la jerarquía eclesiástica de la Iglesia. Con fórmulas aparentemente cristianas, mis defendidos, de todos modos, han sido calumniados públicamente en medios internacionales por parte del padre Marcial Maciel Degollado, L.C., y de colaboradores suyos. Y muchas personas han sufrido en carne propia ataques y vejaciones varios por haber manifestado su solidaridad con mis defendidos en la búsqueda de la verdad y de la justicia.

III. Yo soy el padre Antonio Roqueni Ornelas. Nací en la Ciudad de México, el 11 de Septiembre de 1934. Miembro de familia numerosa. Soy abogado y doctor en Derecho civil y abogado y doctor en Derecho Canónico. He sido miembro del Tribunal Eclesiástico de la Arquidiócesis de México por más de 21 años. Fui ordenado sacerdote en 1963. Trabajé sobre todo con el Cardenal y Arzobispo emérito de la Ciudad de México Ernesto Corripio Ahumada. Tres referencias: los tres últimos presidentes de la Conferencia del Episcopado Mexicano: Cardenal Antonio Adolfo Suárez Ribera (Monterrey, Nuevo León, México); Mons. Sergio Obeso Ribera (Jalapa, Veracruz, México), Mons. Luis Morales Reyes (San Luis Potosí, San Luis Potosí, México).

Besa respetuosamente su anillo pastoral,

P. Antonio Roqueni Ornelas
Montepio Luz Savinon, I.A.P.
Insurgentes Sur, 1162
Colonia del Valle
03100 México, D.F , MÉXICO
México, 5.XI.2002.

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Bad Paranoids and Good Paranoids

in clergy sex abuse scandal, Language, law enforcement, Psychology 3 Comments Tags: , , ,

Der Spiegel has an interview (in English) with Manfred Schneider, who has researched assassinations. Schneider thinks that assassins like Jared Loughner are not crazy but hyper-rational. He explains: 

Every assassin is a perceptive observer and interpreter of signs and events. For him, nothing happens by accident. He scrutinizes the world in search of hostile intentions, and he imagines conspiracies everywhere. To us, the outcome seems insane. Yet logic and rationality are key components in the paranoid suppositions arrived at by the assassin. Paranoia is not irrationality but hyper-rationality. 

Loughner believed he was acting in a rational and moral fashion: 

First of all, from his subjective perspective, Loughner acted in an extremely moral fashion. The paranoiac is saving the world from a threat. He disconnects his system of interpretation from everything else and, within this system, reestablishes an order that is no longer frightening for him. Second, Loughner left behind messages, which is always part of a rational assassination plot. It would seem to be an act that he had spent a long time thinking about and preparing. Third, it was a political act. In the assassin, mania, which can be expressed in endless ways, takes on a political form. Think about the video in which he talks about currency and the gold standard. These are fundamental sign systems in Western societies — and he wants to renew or replace them. That is delusional, but it is an attempt to establish contact with power. 

I had noticed that Loughner had a peculiar fascination with semiotics, how things mean. Schneider explains: 

This fundamental questioning of our sign systems is a symptom we see again and again. The former soldier Denis Lortie, who stormed the parliament building in Quebec on May 8, 1984 and opened fire, said in a pre-attack message: “I want to destroy everything that wants to destroy language.” Loughner, for his part, wrote that the government controls grammar.

There are good paranoiacs, like Sherlock Holmes (and perhaps some bloggers) who piece together seemingly random bits of information to discover the truth.

A snippet of paper here, a little pile of cigarette ashes there. He was a great paranoiac, but he was strictly interested in doing good.

How to tell the difference? Suspicions based on clues can be baseless:

intelligence agencies also apply Holmes’s method. But the analysis that then US Secretary of State Colin Powell presented to the United Nations Security Council in February 2003, which concluded that there were mobile biological weapons laboratories in Iraq, was based on the same structure as the lunacy of Adelheid Streidel, who critically injured (German politician) Oskar Lafontaine with a knife in 1990. She believed that there were underground factories in (the Bavarian town of) Wackersdorf, where people were being killed.

However, suppose a German in 1942 put together snippets of information and decided that the German government was engaging in mass murder of Jews. Wouldn’t he have been considered paranoid by most Germans?

As modern, rational men, we want to find the cause of Loughner’s actions and assign blame; we can’t believe that he had acted in a closed system that seemed rational to him but irrational to the rest of us. Therefore liberals found a target Sarah Palin and the cross hairs she put on the congresswoman’s district:

it’s absurd to assign the blame to Palin. But even without drawing paranoiac conclusions, one can immediately recognize a web of relationships into which the assassination fits and to which Loughner, the killer, consciously refers. And the fundamentalist Republic polemic is part of this context. Take, for example, the use of the term “mind control.” This is the central, paranoiac concept of the American right, which assumes that the government controls the thoughts of citizens through language and the media. It’s paradoxical for Palin to demand that we see the killings as an isolated incident, that is, a chance event. In doing so, she is suddenly abandoning the system of paranoia, with its accusations of mind control, that she and the Tea Party were more or less complicit in creating.

My interest in politics is weak, so I don’t know if Schneider is accurate in his characterization of the Tea Party and Palin.

However, Americans, unlike Canadians, have always been suspicious of government. Such suspicion is for better or worse an abiding national characteristic, and the Left was deeply suspicious of the American conduct of the war in Vietnam.

When does suspicion become paranoia?

When all of the non-rational moments that are part of reason disappear. That’s when it turns pathological. When there are no longer any doubts in a person’s thoughts, and there is no hesitation in his actions. When empathy is no longer possible and the person becomes consumed by the feeling that it is absolutely necessary that certain things be done to prevent the worst from happening. That’s when the person is no longer paranoiac but paranoid.

I am not sure Schneider really answers the question.

George Elser tried to assassinate Hitler.

In that case, it wasn’t the assassin who was paranoid, but his opponents, which included both Hitler and large segments of German society. It is quite possible, and Stalinism is a case in point, that the majority of a group shares irrational, delusional views.

The assassin is the evil paranoiac; the detective and the investigator, the good paranoiac:

He destroys contingency, because he is able to deduce something that makes sense out of seemingly random clues. We delegate our hope that evil can be recognized and therefore combated to crime-solving heroes like Holmes, to investigators and police officers.

But suppose the police are the Gestapo?

An objective moral framework, separate from the individual and even from the society is necessary to distinguish good from evil paranoia. This raises epistemological questions and ultimately theological questions, which I do not want to consider at present.

In a previous career I was a federal investigator doing background investigations. Most were straightforward, but I was always alert to seemingly random cues: slips people made, discrepancies, significant objects.

At the time we were concerned about concealed homosexuality that could open a person to blackmail. I noticed that one person I was investigating had a lambda bumper sticker, and a few things about her background did not fit together. I was pursuing the theory that she was a lesbian, but one of my coworkers, a black woman, informed me that the lambda was the sign of a black sorority, which did not have a clue it was also a symbol for lesbianism. In that case my paranoid theory did not pan out. But in other cases it did, opening cans of worms. One investigator discovered a case of treason by noticing that the house the person lived in was far more expensive that he could have afforded on his government salary.

In investigating sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, one has to be paranoid and try to make sense out of seemingly random clues. We know there was a cover-up, and those responsible for it have still not come clean.

What to make of odds and ends: a priest’s name is spelled differently over the years, he disappears from the Catholic Directory and then reappears again, a bishop vacations in Thailand, a parish has three abusers in residence at the same time, a bishop goes to Rome and immediately tells Father Fitzgerald to ditch his plan to isolate abusers on an island, a bishop is told a priest has abused boys and the bishop immediately makes the priest a boy scout chaplain, and so on. How many of these events are random, how many are clues to something really evil going on? Is the only difference between the bad paranoid and the good paranoid is that the good one is right and the bad one is wrong? But how to tell whether you are right or wrong until you pursue the theory until it is confirmed or disproved – and is it always possible to do one or the other?

 

 

 

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FAZ, TAZ, and Didi

in Germany, sexual abuse 4 Comments Tags: , , , ,

Child Abuser and TAZ Founder Dietrich Willier AKA Didi

Americans are a provincial lot, and the German language is Greek to them. Pope Benedict rightly pointed out that in the 1970s pedophilia was considered progressive.   I specifically pointed out that the co-president of the Green Party in Germany has written in his memoirs he had had sex with the children he was teaching  – he later claimed this passage was mere “provocation”  (épater les bourgeois and all that). Someone replied to me was this was all meaningless, that no one important had ever done such a thing, and who was this Daniel Cohn-Bendit dude anyway? 

The Germans, perhaps having been trained by post-1945 events to look at their history and not turn away from unpleasant realities, are examining the connection of the 1970s Left with pedophilia and pederasty. 

The Tageszeitung (TAZ), a Berlin, leftist newspaper, is shocked, absolutely shocked to discover that one of its founders, the late Dietrich Willier (although following German custom they identify him only as Dietrich W.) was a pedophile. 

The Odenwaldschule, an ultra-progressive school, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) reports, was “a paradise for pederasts.” One of them was Dietrich Willier, who abused at least nine children and had an extensive child pornography collection, featuring victims as young as three. His students remember Willier as “charismatic, anarchist, and crazy.” With his “cool behavior” he connected with his young victims. 

He left the school and started a primal scream therapy institute. One of the former students who visited him there was Andreas von Weizsäcker, who died two and a half years ago. Andreas was the son of the Federal President.

 The editor in chief of TAZ piously declares:  

The connection between abuse of children, the German Left, and also TAZ has not yet been sufficiently publicly explained. 

Die Verbindungen zwischen Kindesmisshandlern, der deutschen Linken und auch der taz zu der Zeit sind offensichtlich noch nicht ausreichend geklärt”

 At the end of the 1970s Willier became one of the founders of TAZ. He served as the Stuttgart correspondent. TAZ provided pederasts a platform, because “part of the Left milieu sympathized at that time with the pederasts, who defined themselves as a liberating movement.” 

FAZ noted that the Pedophile Movement  had its origin in the 1970s in the School Movement. The “General Homosexual Work Society” demanded in the 1970s that “sex between adults and children” must be free of penalties.

Ihren Anfang nahm die sogenannte „Pädophilie-Bewegung“ in den sechziger Jahren in der Schwulenbewegung. Die „Allgemeine homosexuelle Arbeitsgemeinschaft“ forderte in den Siebzigern, dass „Sexualität zwischen Erwachsenen und Kindern“ straffrei bleiben müsse.

That is sex between adults and children should be completely decriminalized. In 1977 in the journal Plasterstand one read:

Since we understand ourselves to be human beings who fight against every oppression, than this applies also to pederasts…We do children violence,  when we do not grasp their sexual needs.

Wenn wir uns als Menschen begreifen, die gegen jede Unterdrückung kämpfen, dann gilt es auch für Päderasten. . . . Wir tun den Kindern ja Gewalt an, wenn wir auf ihre sexuellen Bedürfnisse nicht eingehen.

The editor of TAZ might begin by looking in its own files. FAZ looked at TAZ from the 1970s and discovered: 

The newspaper sympathized with “Pedo-Groups” among other with the Nuremberg “Indian Commune.” In 1979 there appeared in TAZ an article with the headline “Crimes without Victims.” The writer Olaf Stüben announced: “I love boys.”

Die Zeitung sympathisierte mit „Pädo-Gruppen“, unter anderen mit der Nürnberger „Indianerkommune“. 1979 erschien in der „taz“ ein Artikel unter der Überschrift: „Verbrechen ohne Opfer“. Autor Olaf Stüben verkündete: „Ich liebe Jungs“.  

TAZ reports of Willier that everyone thought he was making it with women, especially strong feminist types. But, FAZ notes, 

Whoever concerns himself closely with the topic “Pedo-Criminals” knows: Anyone who once has started to abuse children never leaves off.  

Dabei weiß, wer sich mit dem Thema „Pädokriminelle“ näher beschäftigt: Wer einmal damit angefangen hat, Kinder zu missbrauchen, der hört nicht damit auf

The moral of this story: 

The Catholic Church is not the only organization that is queasy about confronting its past connection with sexual abuse. The German Left is equally reluctant. Perhaps more so. 

Even more importantly: Abusers can exploit a variety of milieus. Abusers like Maciel used the Catholic culture of absolute obedience to get victims; the pedophiles at the progressive schools (and also “cool” priests) used an anything-goes atmosphere to get victims. 

Are there milieus in which abuse is less likely to occur or, if it does occur, to be detected and stopped immediately? That is what sociologists and psychologists should be able to help us determine, but the conversation about abuse has not yet reached this adult level.

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A Pope Deaf to Calls for Justice

in clergy sex abuse scandal, Maciel, murder, Pope John Paul II, Vatican 6 Comments Tags: , , ,

Pope John Paul failed to investigate the charges against Maciel. He let Cardinal Sodano block Cardinal Ratzimger’s attempt to investigate.

 

In November 2002 a letter was sent to John Paul by the Rev. Antonio Roqueñí, the lawyer of Maciel’s victims, via (now  Cardinal ) Stanislaw Dziwisz.

 

El Milenio reports.

 

In the letter the victims state that they know Maciel is maintaining his innocence therefore they ask for the opportunity to present their testimony and evidence before civil and ecclesiastical courts.

 

In the letter the lawyer states of his clients: 

They love and respect the person of the Roman Pontiff, John Paul II… They do not want a media commotion or scandals. They seek justice from the Church as from a mother…My clients do not want to persecute the church, only that father Marcial Maciel submit himself, as every Catholic does, to the imperatives of ecclesiastical justice…One of the sinful acts committed with one of the ex-seminarian plaintiffs took place on Holy Saturday. Another was “aiding” Maciel more than 40 times to satisfy his base passions.

 

Monsignor, the case  is becoming every day more serious,…There have been threats of death and physical harm made by the same Father Maciel Degollado and his friends for the act of having defended and shaving showed solidarity with my clients. They are not unaware that in the Roman Curia there are cardinals and prelates who are well known to use automobiles and other objects of value given, or caused to be given, by Maciel. 

The advocate asked to submit this case formally under Canon Law. He got nowhere, and it was all true – and even worse than he stated.

 

John Paul refused to act. Did his subordinates, including his secretary Dziwisz, intercept letters and keep matters from him. If they did, they did it because they knew he didn’t want to hear such things. If Dziwisz intercepted mail, why is he an archbishop, why is he a cardinal?

 

Or did John Paul know all this, and still refuse to act? These questions should be answered before his beatification – and they won’t be. The cult of celebrity has triumphed in the Church. Truth is irrelevant.

 

As to the death threats – would an incestuous child molester drug addict and thief draw back from murder? I have found numerous murders connected with sexual abuse, and am trying to get up the nerve to write a book about them. See one example of how a priest abuser dealt with men who got in his way: The Rev. Ryan Erickson.

 

 

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If Only the Führer Knew! Part II

in clergy sex abuse scandal, Pope John Paul 11 Comments Tags: ,

Les Femmes website linked to my criticism of the beatification of John Paul. 

This reply I think is typical of the Catholic reaction:  

It is an out-and-out lie to claim that Pope John Paul II failed to carry out the duties of his state in life. Could he have done a better job? Yes, but then again, one could say that about anyone in any situation — no matter how well anybody may do something, they could always do better. Podles’ article is devoted to His Holiness’ handling of the sex abuse situation in the Church. How does he, or you for that matter, know that he did nothing and ignored the problem? He may very well have taken action behind closed doors; I mean, the Vatican doesn’t call press conferences to broadcast such things. Even so, during his years in Communist Poland, the Communists often slandered priests by falsely accusing them of sexual impropriety. So if His Holiness was slow to believe such charges about any given priest, can you really blame him? As for allegedly raising most of the bad bishops in question to the episcopacy, do Podles or you know for certain that he was aware that some of those whom he was appointing weren’t going to be good bishops? Even if he was aware, did it ever cross your mind that maybe he chose the ones he chose because there was literally NOBODY better at the time? But then again, remember that Our Lord chose Judas to be one of His disciples. He also chose Peter, who denied Him three times, and the other disciples, who, except for John, were nowhere to be found during His Passion. One might as well accuse Our Lord of doing a terrible job of choosing disciples.

In closing, I want to say to you, Mary Ann, but also Kindred Spirit, that if the Church does indeed beatify and/or canonize John Paul II (I say “if” because anything could happen between now and May 1), I hope you will humbly submit to the Church’s judgment (and believe me, the Church makes sure to do its homework when it comes to the causes of saints), especially if he gets canonized, as canonizations are infallible.

You see there must be a good reason for what John Paul did or failed to do, because, because, why BECAUSE! Otherwise we could not place childlike trust in the popes and might have to think like adults, judging character and actions by normal human moral standards.

One can see why Freud regarded religion as a sign of infantilism.

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John Paul and the Church of Celebrity

in clergy sex abuse scandal, Pope Benedict, Pope John Paul 6 Comments Tags: , , ,

Sardath said in the comments: 

This is a man who survived the Nazi genocide against the Poles, out-maneuvered the Soviets, and utterly crushed liberation theology; and yet we are to believe that he had no idea what he was doing when he signed false bank documents, had no idea that bishops and priests in Latin American were giving aid and comfort to state terrorism, and had no idea what Law, Groer, and Maciel had been up to all those years?

The “santo subito” people can’t have it both ways. If JP2 really was the intellectual and spiritual titan that he pretended to be, then he must have had the capacity to know and understand what his own people were up to. If he knew and did nothing, he was an accomplice in their crimes; if he could have known but chose not to, then he was criminally negligent, which is almost as bad. Either way, they have no business putting him up for sainthood, because he doesn’t even remotely qualify.

There’s also a big problem with some of the theological positions that Ratzinger staked out on these issues while he was head of the CDF, including the claim that while the pope may not be infallible in his disciplinary decisions, those decisions are nevertheless “not without divine assistance” and therefore “call for the adherence of the faithful.” So if JP2 was not without divine assistance in the way he ran his shop, why has everything come to ruin? What sort of saint is it who holds the position of “Vicar of Christ on earth” but somehow consistently fails to avail himself of the divine assistance which, we are assured, was always available to him if he only asked for it?

And now Ratzinger is pope himself, and so is also presumably not without divine assistance in the decisions he makes–and yet he is not only rushing headlong toward a disastrous premature canonization of his predecessor, but has continued to surround himself with the same people who, we are now being told, wrecked the papacy of JP2 with their lies and corruption. We have been told that it was Ratzinger who tried and tried to clean up the corruption around JP2, but was checkmated at every turn by the evil Sodano. So what is his excuse now? He of all people must know what Sodano and the others were up to, and he of all people has the power to send them packing. Why has he not done so?

John Paul’s refusal to act was inexplicable. Benedict’s is explicable but discouraging. 

I am of course an outside observer, but even Cardinal Schönborn, who pleaded with John Paul to make a statement about Groër and to stem the resignations for the Austrian Church, was baffled by John Paul’s refusal even to say anything. 

I repeat. Cardinal Schönborn read my book Sacrilege, and he said that in the case which he was familiar, that of his predecessor Cardinal Groër, things were worse than I knew. Groër had made strongly homoerotic gestures to almost every student he had come into contact with over the years; Groër stopped short of penetration, but that was the only thing he didn’t do. 

John Paul had appointed Groër archbishop of Vienna over the objections of the Austrian episcopate, because Groër preached Fatima. Even after Groër left Vienna and the scandal was in full bloom, John Paul continued to favor him. Schönborn was in Rome for the consistory in which he was made a Cardinal. Without telling Schönborn, John Paul had invited Groër to Rome and was receiving him socially. When Schönborn was informed of this at a news conference, he uttered some undiplomatic words about the situation.  

Almost the entire Austrian episcopate, including Schönborn, the writer of the Catechism, publicly announced they were sure Groër was guilty. The numerous victims said Groër was guilty. Why didn’t John Paul believe them or at least order a thorough investigation. John Paul not only did not order an investigation of Maciel; he allowed Sodano to thwart Ratzinger’s attempt to get at the truth. 

Benedict apparently has decided that ridding the Church of abusers is enough; he thinks he does not have to change the culture among the hierarchy that allowed the abuse to go on.  

But once Benedict is gone, a new pope may not have the same priorities. He may think that sexual abuse is a minor problem compared to poverty, the conflict with Islam, secularization, and the other difficulties Christianity faces. The bishops can then return to (or continue in) their old ways in countries that do not have the vigorous tort system that the United States has. 

John Paul thought the Church could flourish with PR – and Benedict, by canonizing him, is continuing the policy. Cleaning the Augean stables of the corrupt clergy would be painful, and many of the laity would oppose it, but a church that cultivates only the appearance of holiness without the reality is preparing itself for a crisis as big as the Reformation. Or even worse, no Reformation. Just corrupt and lax mediocrity that narcissistically calls itself holiness. If men turn away from Christianity because it is too austere and other-worldly, it is one thing; but if they turn away because it falls beneath the standards of common decency and honesty, that is another.

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Should the Church Ever Punish?

in clergy sex abuse scandal, Moral Theology, Responsibility 9 Comments

Poussin – The Death of Sapphira

Pope John Paul did not want criminal abuser priests reported to the police. 

He will be canonized and 99.99% of the laity will applaud. 

No one wants anyone to be accountable – for fear they THEY might be held accountable. 

John Allen interviewed Cardinal George, who tip-toed around the delicate issue of whether bishops should ever be held accountable for their failures – basically, George thought, no. 

George did admit that bishops had failed to punish abusive priests, and that they should use their authority of governance to act against such people. 

Many of laity heartily disagree: Here are some of the reactions (and remember, George is speaking of the failure of bishops to punish priests who molested children): 

I am concerned that Cardinal George is talking about governing – Jesus promised servants and persons who lead by example – the use of the term govern indicates that the bishops have forgotten that they are servants first – I also am not sure about the reluctance to punish – servants don’t punish – shepherds don’t punish they guide and they teach – rulers punish – Cardinal George nor any bishop is a ruler. 

The Cardinal says that bishops need to “take possession of their vocation” by being “governors… who exercise the power to punish.”Spoken like the Grand Inquisitor. Christ exercised his power in the form of a servant. His authority was “self-emptying.”The faithful have already seen far too much of the “power to punich” emmanating from today’s bishops. This is not Vatican II thinking. It smacks of the trumphalism of another age.Sorry. But that’s not what people look for in their supposed shepherd.possession of their vocation,” not just as teachers and preachers, but as governors who exercise, however reluctantly, “the power to punish.” 

Perhaps Cardinal George does not know that many Catholics are not interested in the hierarchy’s power to punish, simply b/c they do not recognize it. We are Catholics regardless of what bishops think or proclaim. 

This would be a grave mistake. The truth is that bishops no longer effectively have that kind of power and Catholics no longer will accept the role of ‘child’ and cede the role of ‘parent’ to the bishop. Those days are behind us for good.

Is it revealing — or merely an accident — that nowhere in this article, which spends so much time looking at the role of the bishops, does the word “pastoral” appear? “Punish,” on the other hand, is right there.

Where does Cardinal George find a mandate for bishops to be “governors who exercise … the power to punish?” Certainly not in Christ’s command to His Apostles at the Last Supper: “I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do. … no slave is greater than his master nor any messenger greater than him who sent him.” (John 13:35-36). Nor is it in Paul’s description of what Christ did: “He emptied himself, taking the form of a slave coming in human likeness, and found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.” (Phil.2:5-8).
The true definition of the bishop’s role in the Church is service and leadership (like the “good shepherd” who leads out his flock), a role certainly absent in many recent highly publicised statements and actions by bishops, not only in America. In spite of Cardinal George’s opinion to the contrary, most Catholics seek clear moral principles on which to base their decisions not moral micromanaging by the hierarchy.
The Church of Christ calls for pastoral leadership, not juridical and punitive authority.

“The power to punish!” WHAT? Are we children? George may be the intellectual leader of the Bishops but he’s an idiot.

In the current climate, I’d be very cautious about touting the “power to punish.” Lay people can ignore bishops, celebrate the sacraments as they please, and there is no policing body available to enforce. Cardinal George would find episcopal credibility eroding even further. He shouldn’t dismiss the power to persuade very easily. It sure worked for Jesus.

So the good cardinal says that “bishops are more prepared to ‘take possession of their vocation’, not just as teachers and preachers, but as governors who exercise, however reluctantly, ‘the power to punish’.”Well, lordy-lordy, why am I not surprised by this guy’s remarks???Of course our “JPII” bishops are “more prepared” to “take possession [of] the power to punish”. They stand on their episcopal pedestals, by God, and we’re all gonna’ risk our eternal salvation if we tell these fellas they’re full of it!!!

One might point out the story of Annas and Sapphira in Acts, or Paul’s instruction to deliver a sinning brother over to Satan. Obviously punishment is to be used only in extreme cases, for the good of the sinner and the good of the Church – but the attitude that punishment is NEVER to be used, that bishops should only persuade and never punish, is what allowed sexual abuse to flourish in the Church.

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If Only the Führer Knew!

in clergy sex abuse scandal, clericalism, Pope John Paul II 20 Comments Tags: ,

Ian Kershaw wrote of the common German’s reaction to Nazi excesses and atrocities: 

the myth of ‘if only the Fuhrer knew’ was already at work. Many genuinely believed that matters, especially if unpalatable, were deliberately kept from Hitler, and that if he learned of them he would act swiftly to set things right. 

A similar attitude characterizes most Catholics’ reaction to the possibility that John Paul II was guilty of a major failure in tolerating sexual abuse by clerics. They can’t believe that John Paul knew what was going on and didn’t act. His subordinates most have kept things from him or he must have been disabled or…or…or well something! 

But the evidence is very strong that John Paul knew (or had every reason to suspect) what was going on and decided not to investigate and not to act against it. We do not know his motive for not acting  – probably something to do with clericalism. He feared, probably, that cleansing the Church of this evil would necessarily involve revealing the extent of the evil, a revelation which would discredit the Church, from Marciel Maciel and Cardinal Sodano and Cardinal Castrillón Hoyos down to the abusers in isolated rural parishes. Better the children suffer (however regrettable that might be) that the great work that the Church was doing be undermined. I doubt that he ever put it so baldly to himself, but as far as we can tell from the evidence and his actions and inactions, that in fact is what was in his mind. 

It is the temptation of all those in authority, taking the broad view, looking at the greater good. Another high priest advised, “it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.”

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The Buck Stops at the Top

in clergy sex abuse scandal, Vatican 8 Comments Tags: , ,

In my book Sacrilege, I said that they way tl abusehat American bishops mishandled allegations of abuse was so uniform that it looked like it was the result of a more or less explicit policy set by the Vatican. 

Here is what an Irish documentary is reporting:

In a January 1997 letter to each Irish bishop, marked “strictly confidential”, the Vatican said it would support the appeal of any priest defrocked by the Irish church in connection with child sex abuse. It did so in a number of cases, leading to a threat of resignation by one Irish archbishop.

At a 1999 meeting in Rome the Irish hierarchy was reminded collectively by a top Vatican official that they were “bishops first, not policemen”.

The programme claims the Vatican and Pope Benedict himself failed to apply the norms of canon law to the issue of child abuse, one of the pope’s major criticisms of Ireland’s bishops. The Vatican failed to do so where two US priests were concerned and the pope did so in 2005 where Fr Marcial Maciel, founder of the Legionaries of Christ, was concerned.

In his letter to the Catholics of Ireland last March, Pope Benedict said to his “brother bishops’’ that “you and your predecessors failed, at times grievously, to apply the long-established norms of canon law to the crime of child abuse”.

The Vatican opposed a recommendation in the Irish Bishops’ “Green Book” guidelines on child protection, published in January 1996, which said all allegations of clerical child sex abuse should be reported to the civil authorities.

The programme, by reporter Mick Peelo, also shows a “strictly confidential” letter sent to Irish bishops by the Vatican a year later, in January 1997, which expressed “serious reservations of a canonical and moral nature” about the mandatory reporting of such crimes to civil authorities.

An Irish bishop confirmed to the programme, on condition of anonymity, that he made a note at the time describing this letter as “a mandate to conceal the crimes of a priest”.

The programme also reports that at a 1998 meeting with Cardinal Castrillón Hoyos, prefect of the Congregation for Clergy (1996 until 2006), then archbishop of Dublin Desmond Connell thumped a table in frustration as the cardinal insisted it was Vatican policy to defend the rights of an accused priest above all.

This was all under the pontificate of John Paul II, whom Benedict will beatify in a few months.

Castrillón Hoyos had also written a letter to a bishop praising him for not reporting an abuser to the police. Castillón Hoyos sent copies to all the bishops of the world.

The Vatican has confirmed a letter that shows a former top Holy See official praised a French Bishop for not turning in a priest accused of sex abuse.

The letter dated September 8, 2001, was written by Colombian Cardinal Dario Castrillón Hoyos, then head of the Congregation for the Clergy.


Cardinal Castrillón also delivered a copy of the letter, in which he praised French Bishop Pierre Pican, to bishops world wide.

 

Castrillón wrote: “I congratulate you for not having turned in a priest to the civil administration, and I am delighted to have a colleague in the episcopate who, in the eyes of history and all the other bishops of the world, will have preferred prison rather than to turn in its son-priest.”

 

The bishop, who retired in March of 2010, received a suspended sentence for failing to report Father Rene Bissey who raped and sexually abused a dozen boys over the course of 10 years.

This was the policy under the soon-to-be Blessed John Paul.

I do not think that Benedict or other Vatican officials realize that these facts are available world-wide on the Internet, and will be brought out repeatedly  when John Paul is beatified and then canonized: “Vatican Declares Pope Who Enabled Child Abusers to be Saint.”

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Santo Subito?

in clergy sex abuse scandal, Pope John Paul II, Vatican 18 Comments Tags: , ,

 Pope John Paul and Maciel

Pope Benedict has waived the 5 year period that is normally required for beatification so that John Paul II can be beatified in May.

 

But John Paul’s role on enabling sexual abuse has not been fully explored.

 

Bishop Edward Burns of Juneau has said some very good and very true things:

It has hurt to learn the truth. It has hurt to listen to the pain and anguish of abuse survivors. It has hurt to learn that in this diocese and elsewhere there were priests who betrayed their authority and the trust we had placed in them. Catholics and members of the wider community have been disappointed and angered that Church leaders did not fully exercise their responsibility in dealing with this issue.

But learning the truth of what happened and facing up to it has been the first, necessary step towards healing for victims and to insure the safety of our children. From my perspective, I am convinced that the truth, however painful, will help to free victims and survivors from the hurtful burden of silence which has been imposed on them for too long.

The Vatican should learn and tell the truth about what John Paul’s role was before he is beatified – but Benedict has decided not to do this.

 

I know that John Paul refused to act.

 

Cardinal Schönborn told me that he sat directly opposite John Paul and pleaded with him to make a statement about Cardinal Groër, the Fatimaniac molester that John Paul had appointed, against the advice of the bishops of Austria, to the see of Vienna. John Paul told Schönborn that he would like to make  statement, but that “they” wouldn’t let him.  “They?”  John Paul wouldn’t explain, but it was clear then and Schönborn has sine publicly made it clearer that Cardinal Sodano,  the Secretary of State of the Vatican, and his underlings were protecting molesters like Groër, Gino, and Maciel.

 

Father Tom Doyle wrote a report on sexual abuse and Cardinal Krol personally put it in the hands of the pope.

 

John Paul ignored all this information and let abusers continue in the Church.

 

The Vatican claims that John Paul is not being canonized because he was pope but because of his personal sanctity. This is disingenuous. If he had remained a priest or a bishop, and he had been just as holy would there be any move for his canonization?

 

The Vatican also claims that canonization is not intended to approve all actions that John Paul took as pope. But part of fulfilling the will of God is fulfilling the duties of our state of life – and in John Paul’s case it was the governance of the church. His errors were not of the order of allowing mismanagement of the Vatican Bank or of making ill-advised episcopal appointments. His errors were ignoring the suffering of abuse victims and refusing to rid the church of the culture of sexual molestation. John Paul called Maciel, a drug addict, incestuous child molester and thief  “an efficacious guide to youth.”

 

Almost all Catholics don’t want to think about sexual molestation by the clergy and they will not think about John Paul’s role in allowing abuse to go on. They will turn away from the victims, like people turn their eyes from torture victims, because such thoughts make them uncomfortable – and what is religion supposed to do except make us comfortable?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Priest as Protestant Pastor?

in Uncategorized 1 Comment Tags: ,

 

 

In perusing the Naples Daly News this morning, I came across the curious announcement: 

Pastor in residence

 

The Rev. Thomas Glackin, former pastor at St. John the Evangelist and St. Agnes Catholic churches, will serve as pastor in residence at First Congregationalist Church of Naples. He will share pastoral leadership with the Rev. Les Wicker and will deliver the 8 and 10 a.m. messages on Sunday.

 As I remember, Father Glackin has been on the outs with the new bishop of the Venice diocese, Frank Dewane, over the issue of Voice of the Faithful speakers like Charles Curran. Glackin retired in the fall of 2008, although he not listed a a priest on the website of the diocese of Venice.

 

In the summer of 2009 he became guest pastor of this Congregationalist church and now he is pastor in residence. 

 

 

When I was at the University of Virgina in the early 1970s, a Dominican I knew there, Father Thomas Clifford, was an excellent preacher, so good, in fact that a Baptist church asked him to become their pastor. He was flattered but declined. Has anyone heard of a similar arrangement?

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Jew vs. Jew

in Anti-Semitism, Isreal, Masculinity 1 Comment Tags: , , ,

Israel is experiencing a growing tension between secular Jews and the ultra-Orthodox, the Haredim. The National Post has an article on the phenomenon. The men of the Haredim are exempt from conscription and spend all their time studying Torah – and fathering children. They do not work, but live on welfare.

About half of ultra-Orthodox adults do not work and nearly 60% of the men are full-time Torah students who receive government stipends.

But with a birth rate that far exceeds the national average, their numbers are expected double over the next 15 years. 

Many years ago I saw in picture in Time of a rally of young secular Israeli men who were carrying a stereotypically anti-Semitic poster of a Haredim. It showed a black-coated,  stooped, bearded, overweight reader of the Torah.

 

This version of Orthodox Judaism has found a way to connect men to the religious community but this way of connecting damages their masculinity both in perception and reality.

 

The male also has the important role of protector and provider, as well as fathering children and transmitting religious traditions.

 

The various Anabaptist communities, such as the Amish, seem to have achieved a far better balance of both cultivating the socially useful aspects of masculinity and integrating men into the religious community.

 

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Men and Sorrow

in Masculinity 8 Comments

In his comment, Joe makes the point 

·        Strength is not the absence of tears. Strength is the presence of resolution in the midst of crisis. 

Men should be able to show emotion: Jesus wept.

 

My mother died in my arms. I arranged the funeral, and a friend of mine led his choir. I kept my composure until the In Paradisum, when I began weeping uncontrollably.

 

I was not ashamed of it. My mother had suffered the pangs of childbirth and shed many tears over me as I was growing up. The least I could do was weep for her when she parted from this world.

 

My mother-in-law died  immediately after my mother’s  death. When I drove to her house the first time after her death, I was playing Celtic music. As I drove down the lane to the now-empty house, Lori Pappajohn began playing “I Will Ever Love Thee.” Again I wept. What better tribute could I bring?

 

Another friend of mine had become alienated from his family. He died in my arms, and I had to buy a burial plot and arrange for his funeral.

 

And so on. As I grow older, the list of the dead I pray for every days grows longer and longer, from infants to 12-year-olds to the elderly.

 

Sunt lacrimae rerum.

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