Stop digging.
Cardinal Sodano is at it again–this time he has a few wing men.
“But it’s not Christ’s fault if Judas betrayed” him, Sodano said. “It’s not a bishop’s fault if one of his priests is stained by grave wrongdoing. And certainly the pontiff is not responsible.”
“Behind the unjust attacks on the pope are visions of the family and of life that run contrary to the Gospel,” Sodano said. “Now the accusation of pedophile is being brandished against the church.”
And:
Also rallying to Benedict’s side was Italian Cardinal Giovanni Lajolo, who heads the Vatican City State’s governing apparatus.
The pope “has done all that he could have” against sex abuse by clergy of minors, Lajolo said on Vatican radio, decrying what he described as a campaign of “hatred against the Catholic church.”
And:
“The pope defends life and the family, based on marriage between a man and a woman, in a world in which powerful lobbies would like to impose a completely different” agenda, Spanish Cardinal Julian Herranz, head of the disciplinary commission for Holy See officials, said on the radio.
Pope Benedict has a unique opportunity to explain the actions and inactions of Rome over the past thirty years. What happened in the case of the Fr. Hullermann? Why did the CDF take so long to respond to local bishops who sought to laicize abuser priests for the grave canonical crime of solicitation during confession? How has the internal culture of the church changed with respect to abusive priests and bishops? Those questions aren’t going away, no matter how many conspiracy theories bishops throw at them. And with every spasm of defensiveness shown by curial officials and other bishops, it becomes more difficult for the pope to answer.
One of the most interesting reactions I have seen of late as a defense is to say “look at this case, see how quickly it went, see how something happened.” Yes, I think most people agree, there will be times things went as it should. But I don’t think it proves there is no problem with the system as it is now in place, and that there are no things to find out if we dig further.
It would be like someone saying, “I’m a good Catholic. Didn’t you see me at mass on Easter and Christmas?”
I keep feeling there is something really big which is being covered up; the defensive posture is too much, and too much like with the LC.
Something really big, yes, but it is not covered up. It is naked to public view. And it is this: the Vatican is closely allied to fascist ideologists (Marcello Pera, Silvio Berlusconi) and is itself manned by neocon culture warriors comparable to Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson. The gaffes it is multiplying daily are the typical discourse of the papal court. Indeed, they are the sanitized public version of that discourse.
The NYT this morning said:
“The pope’s own preacher delivered a Good Friday sermon in St. Peter’s Basilica comparing criticism of the church’s handling of the sexual abuse crisis to anti-Semitism, offending abuse victims and Jews.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/07/world/europe/07vatican.html?scp=2&sq=pope&st=cse
But was this really a surprise to anyone? As James Carroll points out in Practicing Catholic:
“As for the Jews, by 2007 there could seem to be no real surprise when the papal homilist who preached that year’s Good Friday sermon in the papal chapel, in Benedict’s presence, openly repudiated the most important elements of the breakthrough Vatican II declaration Nostra Aetate.
http://tiny.cc/endr6
Search terms: Nostra, Mel Gibson, Anna Katharina Emmerich, Pius XII, et al.
I remember a Vatican dignitary, visiting an Asian country, speak in nakedly antisemitic terms (Hitler did not kill that many Jews. etc) in the 1980s. Ideologically, the Vatican is clearly in a state of rancid reaction that recalls the worst days of Pius IX-XII. And it claims to be giving the authentic interpretation of Vatican II…
In an article published in ARCC LIGHT, (which I first read on Catholica.au in 2008), Dr. Christine Roussel captured an excellent insight into Pope Benedict’s personality. She wrote
that from Joseph Ratzinger’s childhood his “world was home, religion and study. When the Nazis upset that world (Ratzinger entered the junior seminary at age 12—but the Nazis closed the seminary a year later), he tried hard to avoid them, and then he ran for home, for his familiar world. This is a pattern I see repeated all through his life.”
Roussel gave a number of instances demonstrating her points illustrating Ratzinger’s personality. While Ratzinger enjoyed the early days of Vatican Council II (with its emphasis on ressourcement—returning to the sources of Catholicism), the mature Council and its liberalism, culminating in “Gaudium et Spes,” which troubled him greatly and he fought it in word and print.
After the Council, Ratzinger was, through the kindness of Huns Kung, invited to teach at Tubingen (the most prestigious and erudite university in Germany). While Kung was not afraid of the lively give and take of both students and faculty at Tubingen, Ratzinger was disturbed to the point where he had to leave it in 1969. He went to Regensburg, a new university which he had just helped establish. He wanted to create a new generation of docile, orthodox theologians (who questioned nothing that was taught them). As Dr. Roussel points out that when Ratzinger’s “beliefs and his authority were challenged, rather than dialoguing, he ran to what was secure and controllable.”
When John Paul II became pope, many believed that Ratzinger was the brains behind the Wojtyla papacy (this is not to diminish Wojtyla’s considerable intellectual gifts, charm and achievements). Both Wojtyla and Ratzinger shared similar traits—arrogant, a narrow-horizon Catholicism, authoritarian, intolerant, convinced of their absolute rightness, and zenophobic. But John Paul II could be more of the Romantic and a dreamer, could have more vision and empathy for the suffering (as he weakened and suffered toward the end of his life), and he lived more by emotion. John Paul II—could feel empathy for the Jews and “Separated Brethern” without worrying that the Church would be weakened while he focused on that. Back home (in the Vatican), Ratzinger the Enforcer kept everyone in place. And when JP II announced that the subject of women priests is closed—and may not even be discussed—Ratzinger chimed in with “And that’s infallible.”
While Wojtyla the Bishop was able to sign “Guadium et Spes” at the Council, Ratzinger the Enforcer distorted that same document to justify “Dominus Iesus” in order to give form to his vision of the Catholic Church, with a reversal of the reforms of Vatican Council II.
Another area that troubled Ratzinger’s comfort and control level was the liturgy. He really wanted to have again a single Roman rite. He wanted the Roman rite of the future to be a rite celebrated in Latin or in the vernacular, but standing completely in the traditiion of the rite translated directly from Latin into the vernacular. When it became likely that Ratzinger would likely be the next pope during the Conclave after Wojtyla’s death, restorationist groups began to prepare for the liturgical and other changes they knew he would make. And voila! We will have a new Roman Missal for English speaking peoples coming to our dioceses in Advent of 2011. Why? Because this is meant to bring the Catholic liturgy back to Benedict’s level of comfort.
We cannot expect Pope Benedict, himself, to come out with anything to uncover the “something really big” that Henry Karison (and thousands like him) believe is hidden.
Benedict believes his position must be separate from the “faithful.” He believes that there must be critical distance separating the church from the culture (John Allen’s biography of Pope Benedict, page 90). And if anything disturbs the Pope’s comfort level—it is the current cultural relativism, modernism and yes, Americanism (even if it is seeking to know the truth).
Finally with so many of the world’s cardinals, arch/bishops, and even parish priests, circling the wagons to protect the psychological home and comfort level of Benedict, we will have to depend upon lawyers, various groups around the world and the media to keep “digging for the truth.”
Thew last sentence of Little Bear’s post is quite important.
Yes, the curial defenders are out in force attacking.
When you’re wrong, a first line of defense is often to go on the attack.
Hence the usual suspects are blamed, the media (like the NYT or using an “inadequate translation” or, God forbid, publishing Dowd – while Donahue rants on about the homosexual problem.)It’s the secular world, while the Pope defends family and life, as if noone secular defends family and life . It’s those anti-Catholics or those with an agenda who want women priests or elected bishops or God knows what else.
So in attacking, we don’t have to be concerned about truth -half truths are enough to get by in PR!
That’s why Little Bear is right that in talking about how the crime of abuse of children within our Church is dealt with may have to come from lawyers, individuals and the media.
Jason Berry’s piece at Politics Daily todaty about Cardinal Levada, current CDF honcho, is particularly enlightening on the problems of the process and how those who critique are attacked!
I am concerned in some of the writing here abou tthe attacks on attorneys for victims because they’re after the money – another attack PR tool that is used to divert attention away from failures in dealin gwith abuse.
In a thread here, someone, I think it was Karlson, talked about our immaturity in the way we look at Rome and the surogates.
I thought that was right on -let’s focus on the issues at hand, not the smakescreens , not the phony apologetics, not play divide and conquer on the liberal/conservative divide..
Here is the Jason Berry article that Bob N. mentioned.
http://www.politicsdaily.com/2010/04/07/cardinal-levada-point-man-in-risky-vatican-strategy-against-the/
How disappointing and frustrating.
A friend compares this mess to baseball (about which I personally know absolutely nothing) – there was a time when steroid use was common. Now it’s forbidden, and they’re careful in their enforcement. Everyone knows that ‘pretty much everyone was doing it’ in the past -whether it’s steroids or covering up for abusers. So what do we do now about all the complicit bishops? I propose – funny this would sound like a radical suggestion in our Church – honesty. This is the reality, we all know it, so say it. The truth coming from the Pope would be cathartic.
Fr. Anthony Ruff, OSB
Little Bear is right about Ratzinger’s personality (though of course there are infinite complexities); but his individual traits are magnified by the court he has built up around him. He beams when Berlusconi or Sodano tell him what he wants to hear. There is no culture here of cathartic truth-telling. The letter to the Irish Bishops was as huge a stretch for Benedict as Queen Elizabeth’s speech about Diana at the time of her funeral was for the royal family. And the letter enacts Benedict’s clutching at home: at the point where he says he will turn to concrete, practical steps he indulges in nostalgic nostrums — the Cure d’Ars, the Friday fast, Eucharistic adoration. But even if Benedict told the whole truth about mistakes of priests and bishops that would not be the kind of truth-telling now needed — truth about the whole ecclesial system as it has dysfunctionally developed. Only a Council can enable that truth to emerge.
I have just read Berry’s article. I have followed this scandal closely for over ten years, I am amazed that I can still be shocked
“But even if Benedict told the whole truth about mistakes of priests and bishops that would not be the kind of truth-telling now needed — truth about the whole ecclesial system as it has dysfunctionally developed. Only a Council can enable that truth to emerge.”
Or the faithful, the priests, and the odd bishop, exercising the fullness of their intellectual and spiritual freedom. We have the same power that Martin Luther King had as he took the plunge into the civil rights movement. We don’t need a new Council, we need to actually implement the last one and stop waiting for Rome to get it together.
This is huge. As most are aware here the closing of ranks at Rome seems to indicate a point of no return. The Vatican is losing whatever moral fiber it had. But it is still lying to the core group which is trying to give support the way Toyota is privately lying to its customers that the recall is a hoax. Some Toyota customers even believe especially since no one wants to admit s/he made a bad decision. That core group supporting the Vatican is fragile now.
Ratzinger should not resign but admit his mistakes and set a specific line of reform, especially accountability in the hierarchy. It would be refreshing to see some humility emerging from the peacocks in Rome.
A prescient analysis by the late management guru, Peter Drucker, reviewing Thomas Reese’s 1989 book Archbishop:
“No other organization to this day equals the Catholic Church in the elegance and simplicity of its structure. There are only four layers of management: pope, archbishop, bishop and parish priest. Armies have 10 layers, and General Motors close to 20. And what in business is called the ‘central staff overhead’ – for the most transnational of all organizations and one serving close to a billion members worldwide – numbers 1,500 people in Rome, far fewer than are employed in the headquarters of the large American corporation.”
“…the archdiocese, as it stands now, is an anachronism and obsolescent. Father Reese focuses on the archdiocese; he mentions bishops and their dioceses only in passing. Yet even his few references make it clear that the much smaller and far less visible diocese outperforms the glamorous archdiocese. It is more modest, closer to clergy and parishioners, far closer to results – and much farther from Rome. And though smaller than the archdioceses, these bishoprics are big enough to support themselves.”
“One archdiocese had a well-loved archbishop who was followed by a tyrant and then by a nonleader. The priests dubbed them, ”Hero, Nero, and Zero.” . . . When Zero retired, the priests were sorry to see him go as they realized how many things he had permitted.”
http://www.nytimes.com/1989/05/28/books/the-divine-flow-chart.html?pagewanted=all
I don’t know if this is a sign of anything but it is unusual. But as usual no reason given. Interesting timing though!
From today’s Toronto Star:
I just registered for the first time, specifically to say (in regards to the quotes in your post, Grant):
What the HELL is WRONG with PEOPLE.
Good grief.
Timing is everything:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/08/world/europe/08church.html
Joe: isn’t that good, even if they kept the reasons secret at the time? For once, a bishop resigned *before* being exposed by the media! Progress!!
test
drip… drip… drip…
I will never understand this total faith they have in deception and smokescreens. Why do they assume that everything they lie about or cover up will stay hidden? It subjects everyone to a drawn-out process where each and every fact has to be painfully extracted from them.
Court cultures run on appearances — la bella figura.
The Galileo case was run on appearances too, and they thought it looked ok for centuries afterwards.
Even the slow formation of an apology about Galileo from 1965 to 2000 was conducted with courtly care for appearances, so that it still has more to do with making the papal monarch and his court look good than with learning from the mistake.
Here’s the story John Borst referred to:
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/791616–st-catharines-bishop-quits
His explanation sounds a lot like the one Scranton’s Bishop Martino gave when he resigned last year.
This morning’s front page bulletin from the Vatican in the Irish Times will be received just as Marie Antoinette’s ‘let them eat cake’ was by her sullen subjects: http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2010/0408/1224267896125.html
How Sodano has the nerve to open his mouth is beyond me. It’s a racket.
“Sodano came over with his entire family, 200 of them, for a big meal when he was named cardinal,” recalled Favreau. “And we fed them all. When he became secretary of state there was another celebration. He’d come over for special events, like the groundbreaking with a golden shovel for the House of Higher Studies. And a dinner after that.”
“Cardinal Sodano was the cheerleader for the Legion,” said one of the ex-Legionaries. “He’d come give a talk at Christmas and they’d give him $10,000.” Another priest recalled a $5,000 donation to Sodano.
Jason Berry covered that Levada story back in 2005 but no one was interested.
http://www.sanfranmag.com/story/man-who-keeps-secrets Maybe people are awake now.
I think the idea that nothing Rome did ever said you could not report to the police is a wonderful fib in its way – when a priest who did go to the police under Levada lost his job. Same for another priest friend who is a survivor – drummed out by his bishop in MA, later identified as an abuser.
As for Galileo, this is too precious – from John Allen’s interview with the priest who handled the issue for JPII:
Looking back, di Rovasenda insists that what John Paul did was not a “rehabilitation” of Galileo or a “revision” of the church’s original judgment, so much as a vindication for a more open point of view that has existed within Catholicism since the 17th century.
“There has always been within the church an opinion and a judgment that can be reconciled with Galileo’s discoveries,” di Rovasenda wrote.
Who knew?? I think I have quoted this before, but it is great comic relief.
Mollie, I agree it does sound very much like Martino’s resignation but he had made all kinds of negative waves throughout his diocese. On the contrary Wingle was quiet to a fault. Just adds to the mystery!
Interestingly the post I shared was the entire content at the time. The URL is the same but it is now a Canadian Press story and the one I shared had a Hamilton Spectator by-line (a paper in the Star chain).
I just learned of our David Gibson’s interview on CBC radios The Sunday Edition on April 4th David’s interview begins at minute 11 of hour one. You need itunes to listen to it.
http://www.cbc.ca/thesundayedition/shows/201004/20100404.html
Vatican Radio says the attack on the Pope comes from “economic lobbies”.
A blog at La Repubblica interprets this as an echo of Mussolini’s “Jewish plutocracy”: http://rampini.blogautore.repubblica.it/2010/04/07/contro-il-papa-la-lobby-ebraica/
Latin America is the new scandal front and is having lots of problems with the German Pope reports the newspaper in the Pope’s native Bavaria: http://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/832/507983/text/6/
I see Catholic anger looking for a scapegoat and Benedict sleep-walking into the role.
The beat goes on…
Vatican Radio’s “economic lobbies” charge is a disgrace. You don’t have to scratch below the surface too much after all.
One of the interesting fall outs has been lots of internet static on “why should I stay a Catholic?”
Msgr. Harry Byrne at his Archangel blog had a nice piece about the triduum at St. ann’s in Ossining, NY and how the awfulness of what happens was dealt with but kept in perspective by the pastor there (Fr. Ed Byrrne -selected as one of five outstanding priest b NPLC a couple years ago) by focusing on Christ and the saving events and the celebration of these in that very diverse community.
The spin goes on, protecting the system and the Pope, trying to shelter him and the way the Vatican does business. and it’s that spin that is making people question.
If it’s all about Rome and not about the Savior, the spin may just push more out the door.
That article quoting Sodano from the Irish Times is absolutely infuriating.
“‘What we are dealing with now is a cultural battle: the pope embodies moral truths which people don’t accept and for that reason the shortcomings and errors of priests are used as arms against the church,’ he told the Vatican daily L’Osservatore Romano. ”
“Shortcomings and errors”? Really?
Don’t forget, “Those kids were just asking for it!”
http://www.typicallyspanish.com/news/publish/article_14332.shtml
Please, please stop digging!
I wonder, isn’t digging exactly what we need to expose what a more sophisticated strategy could not? What’s really there.
Maybe digging is needed to wake up passive, deferential Catholics, so that the pressures for reform will be strong enough to penetrate the facade, the bella figura.
Dig, baby, dig.
I tried out the “economic lobby” phrase on a distinguished historian and he supplied the word “Jewish” before I had finished my sentence.
Interesing comment on the Spanish bishop’s remarks here: http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2010/04/quote-of-day-bernando-alvarez.html
Sharp comments here: http://www.themarknews.com/articles/1275
Very view commentators appear to remember that all of this happened in Canada in the late 80′s early nineties. I’m sure you all remember the Mount Cashel mess in Newfoundland.
Dennis Gruending at his Pulpit and Politics blog has written a very interesting piece in which he casts back to his four years working for Canada’s Catholic bishops in the early 90s in the communications department to provide some context for how the church handles such allegations.
http://dennisgruending.ca/pulpitandpolitics/2010/04/07/catholics-and-child-sexual-abuse/
It is now a familiar story.
I keep thinking of Ghandi and Martin Luther King. How about we have perpetual picketing of the Vatican? Americans on Mondays, Germans take Tuesdays, etc.
It seems to me that the Pope comes out of this as the most honorable fellow in a corrupt court. His position as top of the ecclesiastical pyramid, however, makes him an irresistible target for all the angry people — and they are many!
Here is an analysis of the Vatican’s reactions from Siamo Chiesa (We Are Church): http://donfrancobarbero.blogspot.com/2010/04/il-coraggio-della-verita-e-della.html
The coverage is one-dimensional: http://clericalwhispers.blogspot.com/2010/04/rabbi-calls-media-coverage-of-church.html
Once I saw a shocking incident with someone close to me, profoundly against our values. A little later I wanted to discuss it and try to make sense out of it, but my friend refused: “We must not tell anyone. We must not discuss it among ourselves. We must not even think about it.”
I would think that the culture of secrecy developed around the problem of sexual abuse by children is also a consequence of that attitude: when something happens that you cannot integrate in your value system, try to make it disappear by pretending it didn’t really happen.
Isn’t it possible that bishops used to have that reaction?
oops.should have read: “sexual abuse by clergy”, obviously.
Ann: re Ghandi and Martin Luther King, I think there’s more to civil disobedience than picketing. Let’s all start engaging in “Papal Disobedience.” The nuns have given us a start by refusing for the most part to fill out the “visitation” questionnaires — maybe this is our Rosa Parks Moment. And imagine if bishops stopped running to Rome for every little thing. It’s not outside the bounds of imagination to think Archbishop Weakland could have just done what he thought was right, regardless of what the Vatican said.
One of my fav quotes related to this topic: “Vigorous minds will not suffer compulsion. To exercise compulsion is typical of tyrants; to suffer it, typical of asses.” – Erasmus
Claire,
I don’t think that the bishops were pretending that it didn’t really happen. Perhaps they were not equipped with the proper knowledge, skills, and abilities to successfully implement solutions. Perhaps they were hoping against hope that the situation would resolve or improve in its own. They were most likely afraid that these things could happen at all in their diocese. How would you like to find out that your own brother was a child molester? However, hope alone doesn’t make anything go away on its own, people need to face their very real problems, no matter how afraid they may be. And we have. We are. How many programs have been started for the victims? How much money has been disbursed for settlements? How much stricter are the requirements to work anywhere near children in this day and age?
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1001484.htm
Still another sad response on this issue from the Vatican :(
German monsignors can fall on their swords, curial guys can condemn the media, child protection measures can be put into place, etc., etc.
Ultimately, however, it’s a systemic thing, a cultural matter.
And the pope and his minions know it.
And they’re not gonna’ yield any ground.
By God, no.
And still more from the Toronto Globe & Mail:
“The Troubled Church
Vatican, Canadian church officials tried to keep sex scandal secret” (This is coming forward now because of the release of documents associated with a trial now underway.)
http://bit.ly/aF2P51
The latest from the AP:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_POPE_CHURCH_ABUSE?SITE=CARIE&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
“It seems to me that the Pope comes out of this as the most honorable fellow in a corrupt court. His position as top of the ecclesiastical pyramid, however, makes him an irresistible target for all the angry people — and they are many!”
Fr. O’Leary: yes, he is truly the “point man”! As Grant said in the original post: “Pope Benedict has a unique opportunity to explain the actions and inactions of Rome over the past thirty years.”
Please, Holy Father, speak! Say words of love and truth. and penitence.