Text: Pope's letter to Catholics of Ireland

So, Benedict, what are YOU going to DO! One only need imagine Jesus going into the temple and seeing the money-changers; JESUS didn't ask for prayers for those evil-doers, HE DID something! He ELIMINATED the problem. Benedict, for whatever reason, you still don't understand that the structure of the church is what enabled these crimes to occur and flourish. YOU need to begin a restructuring--------similar to what JESUS did with the tables and chairs of the money-changers! YOU are the one responsible to begin the restructuring and dismantling of the hierarchical power structure of the church; return the church to the lay people, the People Of God, the same ones that Jesus gave his church to. If you are unable to do this because of your age or alliances with other hierarchical cliques, then you need to do the honorable thing and step down.

"The programme of renewal proposed by the Vatican Council II was sometimes misinterpreted and indeed, in the light of the profound social changes that were taking place, it was far from easy to know how best to implement it. In particular, there was a well-intentioned but misguided tendency to avoid penal approaches to canonically irregular situations. It is in this overall context that we must try to understand the disturbing problem of child sexual abuse, which has contributed in no small measure to the weakening of faith and the loss of respect for the Church and her teachings."

So, it is Vatican II's fault. Well, I am glad that has been cleared up.

Steve

Reading this letter, I don't see anything that I would not have expected, including paragraph 4, which sets, what the Pope believes, to be the context for the abuse. That paragraph makes it plain that this Pope, and therefore this Church, will not come to grips with the plain truth about human sexuality. Dealing with the process of formation is surely important, but I don't see that (along with copious prayer, penance, and Eucharistic Adoration) as the total answer.

The social and cultural changes of the past 30-40 years made it possible for the abuse to be named and for action to finally be taken. Had the status quo continued I think the abusers would not have been outed. But those changes also resulted in a new understanding of what it means to be a human in relationship to others, including gender roles and gender orientation. This Pope is unable, and thus unwilling, to honestly face those changes. I don't believe he is capable of doing anything that may upend what he believes to be true about the role of the Church and who guides it. So the solutions he offers are all within the context of what he believes about the Church and the role of those who participate in various aspects of its life. To expect anything else is to expect the improbable, if not the impossible.

If the pope really wishes to change things, he would order all bishops to open to civil authorities all files of suspected abusers and those involved in cover-ups. Those responsible should not be given protection from civil penalties.

Point Number Seven is not strong enough. The priests who commit pedophilia and other sexual crimes against others need to be put in prison along with the other run of the mill sex offenders and put on the national and state sex offender registries so that people can be warned if they, laicized or not, appear in nearby neighborhoods. They should be made to wear an ankle bracelet and monitored 24/7. They are criminals, plain and simple and should be treated that way. No amount of "penance" and "therapy" can fix this problem and all are in danger from repeat offenders.

From the Pope's letter it would seem that Vatican II is partly responsible for clergy abuse of the young and that the laity of the Irish church - including the abused and their families- are to be at the vanguard of repentance!
While acknowledging that many harmed were not listened to, the Pope says nothing about demands for secrecy from church authorities. Similarly, a visitation/investigation focused on Ireland conveniently diverts attention from Vatican policies and actions/inaction.
I fail to see how this letter will bring comfort or confidence.

This is very carefully crafted language...
Very "churchy" in tone.
Must read between the lines.

First impressions...
...letter is 3 or 4 pages too long
...many, all too many, sections reflect B16's desire to restore a pre VII church.
...much of the letter simply uses obfuscating language to detail what people already know: people's hearts and minds don't need to be told what they know from experience.
...I'm curious about how many people up and left Mass when the letter was read.
...there is little actual concrete action proposed and by this I mean that Rome proposes actual grace filled restorative efforts other than the retro Eucharistic Adoration and return to Confession. Who really is going to go to confession when trust between priests and laity is broken?

Still...may this letter begin Rome's renewal.

Very carefully crafted Church language...

Pope Benedict XVI is to be commended for this letter. It could be the beginning. I hope, pray that it is.

"So, Benedict, what are YOU going to DO!" TAQ asks and suggests "restructuring" "-similar to what JESUS did with the tables and chairs of the money-changers!"

Jesus' restructuring was so much more profound. What did he do? He first of all laid out his message, his mission in its essence and in non-compromising clarity (cf. "Sermon on the Mount" and aptly paraphrased by Paul, I Corinthians,ch.13). Secondly, he identified a few good friends seemingly untainted by "the cloth", ambition, who would never have been admitted to the seminary, let alone the clergy. Thirdly, he thoroughly revealed the perversity, the self-serving dishonesty and hypocricy of the prevailing hierarchy and hierarchical system and, for all time, the inevitable self-serving dishonesty and hypocricy of non-accountable hierarchical systems. He did this not only by argument, debate but primarily by offering his innocence to the institution in an opportunity to DEMONSTRATE that they got the "message". They used their public defference, political connections and money to have him falsely charged, publicaly humiliated, tortured and then murdered, executed as if he were a/the criminal.

Fourthly, he trusted his father, his weak human friends and family, his message, and he un-believably returned to life, glorious yes, but humbly. He just walked away from the tomb in which he had been buried. He finished his teaching and trusted his followers to respect and disseminate his message and heed his WARNING about the institutionalization of hierarchy and religion.

Memories are short eh? Now I will read Pope Benedict's letter and see if I can identify Jesus in it.

"4. In recent decades...The programme of renewal proposed by the Vatican Council II was sometimes misinterpreted and indeed, in the light of the profound social changes that were taking place, it was far from easy to know how best to implement it. In particular, there was a well-intentioned but misguided tendency to avoid penal approaches to canonically irregular situations. It is in this overall context that we must try to understand the disturbing problem of child sexual abuse, which has contributed in no small measure to the weakening of faith and the loss of respect for the Church and her teachings."

It is such a relief to know that the true cause of these problems is that imposter, John XXIII, who insisted upon dragging the Church from the comforts and certainties of the fifteenth century. It must be indeed far from easy to know right from wrong, to know which actions deserve condemnation (such as contraception) from those which should be quietly swept under the rug (such as pedophelia)...

Benedict mentions society's "tendency" to favor the clergy and other authority figures and the misplaced concern for the reputation of the Church--AS IF these were concerns invented by the laity!!!! The clergy and hierarchy, including his own policy requiring total SECRECY are what created these "misplaced" concerns and tendencies! These are not ... See Moresocial errors, but canonical ones forced upon the laity, and in Catholic countries, upon all society! The Irish brought all that, along with and as part of the Faith they live, as they emigrated to America, Canada, Australia and New Zealand--and we all have the self-proclaimed power of the hierarchy, and clergy to thank for the screwed-up attitudes within, as well as pedestals created by, the laity. The blame needs to be placed where it began in the addiction to power within the RC clerical structure. Sexual abuse is about POWER over another. Ministry is about the power of Love FOR another. Benedict's letter to the Irish, pious as it reads, totally ignores where the blame really belongs. He needs to acknowledge that he, himself, solidified the cult of secrecy--even AFTER the revelations of tremendous abuse were made public around the world. All the pious words amount to nothing without honest admission of his own culpability (as well as his former boss' culpability) as the leaders of the pack.

TAQ: Amen!

TAQ, you seriously underestimate God's power and the power of prayer. Pope Benedict understands what allowed these crimes to occur much better than you do. The Church you long for is not a Catholic one. Protestant, perhaps.

Thank you, NCR, for publishing the entire letter. Most of the world will only read articles given impressions of it. You do a great service by making the entire this easily accessible.

I will be praying the Prayer for the Church in Ireland.

Year of the Priest- How appropriate! It is the year for a New Priesthood and the Year for bringing down Benedict and the Hierarchy!! God Bless the Future Catholic Church, the church of the people.

I applaud Pope Benedict XVI for finally speaking of the shame these priests and religious have brought upon the church, not the victims who speak out every day. But when he asks the victims to find Christ within the community of the Church, he has it backwards...It is the Catholic Church who must seek and find Christ in the victims of sexual abuse by the clergy!!! And I agree with TAQ, that the structure of the church must change, and the church must be returned to the people, just as Christ returned to bring Himself to the people.

Thank God we have a Pope like Benedict who is doing something. He knows that real change and strength comes through our Lord Jesus and spending time in prayer. It is only there that we will find the solutions and grace to do what is necessary to heal the Lord's body that we have again wounded by our many sins.
Lord have Mercy on us and help us all to stand up and seek to heal the Body of Christ with all our hearts. Let us each ask Jesus what we can do.

All excuses and blame -- blame the "secularized society" --- blame the "system for selecting seminarians" But do respond with concrete solutions. Prayer isn't the answer. Get the millstones ready and turned those accused over to the civil authorities post haste. Criminals are criminals with or without a Roman collar or a religious title.

And what about this proclamation:
ncronline.org
VATICAN CITY -- A priest who confesses sexual abuse in the sacrament of penance should be absolved and should generally not be encouraged by the confessor to disclose his acts publicly or to his superiors, a Vatican official said.

Vatican speaks with forked tongue.

When you remove Archbishop Brady I will hear your sorrow just a wee bit louder.

I agree in large part with TAQ. On their recent ad limina visit, Benedict was forceful in telling the Scottish Bishops to inform the laity not just be 'collaborators' with the clergy, but to be 'co-responsible'.
That means in anybody's language that the laity must be part of the decision-making processes in the Church, because at the heart of all sexual abuse is power and secrecy.
I was ordained in 2000 at the age of 42 after a long career in a paramedical science. I could not believe how childish the training was, especially inthe first two years. Sexuality and all things associated were almost a taboo subject. Ongoing psychological assessmentwould definitely to help
I have since argued forcibly that the training of priests much be radically changed. All male seminaries should be scrapped forewith. Students should do their studies in secular universities and do far more work in parishes before ordination, hopefully ensuring a rather more balanced education and to determine an aptitude for pastoral work.
The election of a Pontiff who, I beleieve, has only done one year working in a parish is utter madness. That must restrict his own pastoral experience at ground level.
In 'Pastores Dabo Vobis' there was a great deal of talk about "human formation". It simply did not happen in the seminary in Rome where I was trained. I have had more human and spiritual formation in Alcoholics Anonymous thatn I ever had in seminary.
Benedict is only a product of system that produces clerics, not pastors, abd clericalism is killing the priesthood. I don't blame him for the system, but he does have the power to start changing it.

what kind of structuring do you recommend?

I read Pope Benedict's Letter to the Catholic Church in Ireland while on a weekend retreat (yes, I know I should have resisted the temptation to hit the web!).

My first reaction was one of utter dismay. Yes, there was the acknowledgement of the serious sinful and criminal nature of what had occurred. Yes, the letter recognises the many failures of church authorities. And,yes, it was at least heartening to see some recognition of the need for "a new vision". But what alarmed me was the underlying assumption that the way forward involves a "restoration", a return to the Ireland that we once knew where traditional practices of piety routinely shaped our faith and spirituality. Equally, for the second time within the last few months Pope Benedict XVI informs us that it is our adoption of more secular ways is the root cause of what has gone wrong. How can this possible be true?

As a member of a religious congregation that has been prominently associated with the commission of some of the abuses, I can state without fear of contradiction that almost ALL of the abuse occurred in the period when traditional practices, traditional theology and ultra-montane clericalism were at their height. It was the pietistic assumptions of that period with it's all too facile designation of abuse as "weakness" and "sin", linked to the adoption of a religious culture of blind obedience, that permitted and legitimated the culture of secrecy and cover-up that we now rightly condemn. Prayer and penance have a role in our response. But, God forbid that we should assume that Vatican II or a culture of freedom in the Church have been to blame for the abuses of the past. What is needed is more freedom, greater transparency and stronger accountability, not less.

The Pope did not acknowledge his role in the cover up of recycling of priests. This is criminal behavior and Ratzinger knows it. He does not have the moral backbone to own up to his own participation in this criminal behavior. It is unacceptable that Catholics be expected to just look the other way. For the good of the Church and the Gospel message of Christ, Benedict needs to resign, along with every other prelate who participated in criminal behavior in the same way Ratzinger did.

Vatican II SHOULD NOT BE BLAMED for the commission of sexual crimes in the Church, but it helped make it possible that these crimes CAME TO LIGHT and helped laity feel they should and could do something about it. That is a HUGE difference. It is well known that clergy and Church hierarchy have committed sexual crimes through out history, maybe not more than the rest of society. The statistics are probably not around but would certainly not exonerate any group.

Laity must continue to point out that transparency is absolutely necessary in any institution to prevent and nip in the bud any kind of abuse. Laity (elected by laity, not appointed) must be included in every level and every area of its functioning.

Meanwhile on the other side of the world:
http://www.ucanews.com/?p=68874
http://www.ccbi.in/viewnews.php?action=viewmore&value=4224
http://www.cathnewsindia.com/2010/03/22/malabar-brother-remanded-for-chi...
Isolated coincidence or proverbial TIP of the ASIAN iceberg?
Memo to Joseph Ratzinger:
The garden variety of PAPAL BULL you're currently peddling in Ireland and undoubtedly planning to "spread" around the rest of the continent will definitely NOT play over here in Asia, so I wouldn't be planning any well-meaning canonisations in the near future. In the event that you do, you may just find the response to be a bit more Biblical -as in OLD TESTAMENT- than the politely disenfranchised or predominantly disinterested Europeans.

It is very sad and tragic that this pope is using abused children as his way to call back the great renewal that was started by the Vatican Council. Collegiality, and openness to one another expressed in loving actions and openness to God expressed in a meaningful liturgy reflecting the words and expressions of the local churches leads to openness to see and react to improper behavior by those in religious or ecclesial roles. Whether it is the mismanagment of money, the abuse of alcohol or drugs or the worst, the abuse of children, openness brings these to light - not to be hidden to be repeated over and over again. Rather openness calls this behavior for what it is and demands appropriate civil and liturgical punishment. To force people to pray in arcanne words, to force local bishops to strictly obey the bishop of Rome rather than share in the collegiality of the bishops is what forces secrecy, obedience and a blindness to abuse or to properly resond to it.
To blame the Vatican Council is so misplaced!!!! It shows how the smartest church rulers motivated to keep power will use any excuse, namely priest abusing children, to bring back the good old days of secrecy and obedience and definitely the atmosphere of not questioning religious about suspicious practices. To blame Vatican II and its openness to a secular world, for the abuse of a child is a dangerous mindset and total lack of understanding protocols which exist to explain the presence of abuse in the abuser. In meetings that I have attended, I do not believe Vatican II was ever blamed once. Serious Roman misunderstandings will lead to future generaations of children being abused and to future generations of cover-ups. The Church will be setting the scene for a whole new generation of child molestors who do their work in secrecy and for a whole new generation of child victims who suffer in silence at the hands of their priestly, religous or ecclesial abusers.

Regardless of degree of consultation, the appointment of Bishops is a thoroughly Papal dominated process jealously guarded, secretive, strategic and, at least in rhetoric and intent, free from secualar intrusion. Bishops are the popes men, the field officer/managers (priests and religious are the fodder, the flack-catchers – as Tom Wolf would say - for the bishops). It is unconscionable and less than morally or , intellectually acceptable for the papal “pastoral” letter to begin by denying the corelative responsibility downward for the minions he has appointed and who are sworn by sacred oath to support and obey him.

Benedict clearly understands this and says as much in the opening sentence, “...I write to you as the Pastor of the universal church”, a sweeping generalization that embraces in his benevolent mandate to lead and care for the entire church so persistently defined as “hierarchy” and “down” to its individual members. Then he not only distances himself from his bishops but callously disjoins himself from his sacred hierarchical intermediaries, these fellow clerics who represent with him the fullness of the priesthood: “I can only share in the dismay and the sense of betrayal that so many of you have experienced on learning of these sinful and criminal acts and the way Church authorities in Ireland dealt with them.” He shares in the “sense of betrayal” as if he were a victim and not by office a causal factor and responsible supreme director and CEO, let alone benevolent pastor. He then prevaricates in excluding “Church authorities” from inclusion in the sins and crimes. I suspect that his hierarchical brothers in Ireland did not miss this general's abandoning them in the field of a losing battle and will not be very much consoled by his not including them in the sin and crime, as if he were a proper judge of either.

“I have been deeply disturbed by the information which has come to light regarding the abuse of children and vulnerable young people by members of the Church in Ireland, particularly by priests and religious.” Let's be honest, the two investigations of abuse have been in process for, what 10 years? By edict every file on abuse by priests and religious had be submitted to Ratzinger over the years and his Irish bishops and nuncio have, without a doubt, kept him fully informed. “Come to light”? Ratzinger/Benedict knew more about the abuse of children in Ireland and sooner and in more detail than either the Ryan or Murphy commissions. "(P)articularly by priests and religious" - does not the action of the bishops constitute "abuse of children"?

While the letter has some significance, its substantive evidence of Jesus, of the Holy Spirit, of healing and new beginning will emerge, not from Benedict XVI but rather from the “you and I” recognition of its strategic and political self service, from an honest holding to account, and challenge for appropriate response and change.

“I am truly sorry,” Benedict addresses the victims and families of the abused. It took him six whole paragraphs of qualitications, self-justification and self-exoneration to arrive at that point. He means it of course, but within the context he set for himself and within the heuristic (hierarchical) structure of his person, persona, faith, and vision of church that is clearly priorized. It is that context and priorization that renders his apology virtually meaningless in the language of the “simple people”, the little people whom bishops, including himself, were established to “protect”.

“(I)n order to recover from this grievous wound, the Church in Ireland must first acknowledge before the Lord and before others the serious sins committed against defenceless children”, he attests. Somehow his church is no longer “universal” and centralized, or is this simply for the purpose of his apologetic? Benedict's ecclesiastical rhetoric is hardly ever less than universal and centralist but suddenly.... the supreme centralist has de-centralized. Will he also blame the “Church in Germany”, his Germany? Will he be able to maintain his distance from the actual “universality” of abuse and consistency of hierarchical response when he writes to the abused and about abuse in Germany?

Between paragraphs one and his apology, a poetic and self-serving history of Catholic Ireland is, I assume, intended to ingratiate himself . While complimenting the Irish on their contribution to the salvation of civilization he fails to mention that it was the emissaries from Rome who later crushed that energy and spiritually infused faith reining in the recalcitrant Irish and their mainland cousins to obedience and obiesence to the hierarchical patriarchical Roman model. (English historian E.Gibbons remarked that while Caesar needed six legions to conquer Britain, Rome, via Augustine of Canturbury needed only forty monks). Does he really believe that the piety of the Irish, as in most countries, over these years did not, along with defference to the clergy obscure and facilitate physical and sexual abuse?

En route to his “apoligy” he can not resist blaming his pet “secularism” misleading the courageous Irish, he adds other favourites which sort of sum up as the “traditional markers” - “traditional adherence to Catholic teaching and values”, frequent confession, daily prayer and annual retreats, seminarian selection and formation, and, of course “mininterpreted” “programme of renewal proposed by the Vatican Council II”. He is using the Irish people, the victims of sexual predation and predation management by hierarchy – this “pastoral” letter as a further justification for a headlong retreat into an irrelevant and equally if not more perverse medieval, partriarchical model of Church. He even blames Vatican II for a “misguided tendency to avoid penal approaches to canonically irregular situations”. Is he saying “spare the rod and spoil the child”? Is this not the poor house, the work house mentality of state and church run institutions that gave rise to much of the abuse and protected , hid, and even justified the abusers?

Then, and only then - after a specious presentation of his thesis, condemnation of his “strawmen” of causality, self-exoneration and elevation of his model of traditional hierarchical patriarchy - does he get around to the abject “apology”: “I am truly sorry”. I cannot but see paragraphy one to five as mental reservations which condition his “truly” and “sorry” to virtual irrelevance.

Luke (2:39-52) tells of Jesus being “lost in the temple”. That year, returning home from religious observances of the Passover in Jerusalem they lost sight of Jesus. Thinking him safely somewhere in the midst of family and fellow pilgrims it took a full day's journey before they seriously worried. Not finding him they returned to Jerusalem. It was three days later that they found him – in the Temple, safe among the religious teachers, Rabbis – safe. In spite of all that was to happen between Jesus and the official religion no record of concern, not even a hint of reservation was ever evinced as to the safety of children in their midst.

The same writer who referred to the deserved punishment of anyone who led a child into sin (Luke 17:2), writing 200 years after Jesus, would have been keenly sensitive to any such question regarding the safety of children in “sacred space”.

The emerging story of hearing impaired boys molested over decades in a school for the deaf is even more poignantly disgusting when we consider how the equivalent public authorities, “teachers”, religious, priests, bishops, archbishops, vatican authorities, including Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger were themselves “deaf” to their pleas to have it stopped, to have it redressed. “Father Murphy continued working in parishes and schools, with deaf people, and leading youth retreats in the Diocese of Superior for the next 24 years” (New York Times, March 26, 2010).

The product of the same vatican, the same hierarchy, the same system which wrote the Pastoral Letter to Catholics of Ireland is that which waited generations to act. It is the same “vatican” whoever presides, that is more concerned - with chronology of events and the perverted priest's “plea”; - with establishing a narrow time-line to the pervert's death, - and distancing Ratzinger/Benedict from culpability; - more concerned with publicly denouncing the media which released and stays with the story than with the deaf boys, the discouraged, faith-challenged adults and the failed faithful, the institutional and regulatory systems causality.

I, personally, read the rest of the pastoral letter, some of it language I could otherwise identify with and that needed to be said, from the perspective of every Irish, American, Canadian, German, Austrian, Indian, Dutch, New Zealand, Australian.... child who has been abused by a priest or religious. I read it in light of the institutional and hierarchic context which not once is reflected upon or referred to as facilitatory to abuse, sexual and otherwise, as needing radical reform. The only thing that is “fundamental” about this pastoral letter is its root in a fundamentally medieval perspective and vision of church

The “concrete initiatives”? Piety! Traditional sanctimonious, head in the sand, --“Friday penances”, “intentions”, “offering-up”, “fasting”, confession, (Thankfully the term used in my youthful school days Lenten practice - “ejaculations” was avoided), “Eucharistic adoration”, “national mission” “and in every diocese there should be churches or chapels specifically devoted to this (Eucharistic adoration) purpose". What? More “shrines”? And, of course, another “Apostolic visitation”.

The understory here is a return to the “traditional Catholic markers” - latin mass, communion rails, rosary, habits, collars. Underlying these are ingrained and re-empowered hierarchy, absolutist beliefs, rote adherence, unaccountable patriarchical exclusively male despotism, obedience and obeisance, and maybe once again in Ireland, at least, maybe a church run government.

“I am confident that this programme will lead to a rebirth of the Church in Ireland...”, Pope Benedict assures us benignly.

There is one sentence of profundity herein. It occurs in paragraph 4: “Only by examining carefully the many elements that gave rise to the present crisis can a clear-sighted diagnosis of its causes be undertaken and effective remedies be found.” The balance of the pastoral letter, before and following does serve to demonstrate with utter clarity that Pope Benedict XVI and his “establishment” is incapable of addressing this call of the Holy Spirit, demand of Christ through his children and epic historical opportunity.