On Disciplining Bishops
September 24, 2010
THE REV. JAMES JACKSON writes:
In the post on the Pope’s visit to England, you mentioned several things and I’d like to respond to them:
1. “There was no forceful statement by the Pontiff on disciplining bishops and Church officials…” This is true. But I’m going to withhold my disappointment until I understand why he does not speak about this.
2. “Until those who aided and abetted…the Church’s efforts at repentance are inadequate.” This is also true. Words are not enough; not even words given to God in prayer. Charity is built on justice, so the absence of justice dilutes the charity, even the compassion to victims.
3. But the statement of the SNTAB (if that’s the right acronym) is not correct. There are quite a number of cases where discipline was administered to bishops and other officials for this in Church history; one of your readers alludes to it. But that would not be to the point for the trip to England. I had to think about this one, so I spoke personally to a bishop who would know the answer. He knew of five bishops who have been removed from office because of this very thing. He thinks there are more, but he can’t be sure. The canonical trial of one of those who have been removed has not ended, since the Holy See is contemplating reducing that miscreant to the lay state, though I can’t see how that could be done, either theologically or canonically. I refer to that creep in Belgium who abused his own nephew.
So a serious question on this is why the Vatican is not making these trials more public. I have some ideas as to the answer, but they would be mere speculation.
4. The Pope said, “We know that this is an illness…” This is a very difficult question for me; determining moral culpability in the case of severely diminished free will is a tough one. But it seems to me that this must be a guiding principle to the Pope’s decision to keep the trials private.
Laura writes:
Thank you for writing. Regarding Roger Vangheluwe, the bishop of Bruges, he resigned after his abuse of a nephew for seven years was made public and the Pope recently announced that he would not be defrocked. I have difficulty understanding that given the nature of the offense and its damage to the priesthood at large.
The Pope’s reference to the “illness” of pedophilia is disturbing. In any event, there would be no question of illness in the administrative handling of pedophilia cases.
Father Jackson adds, on the issue of the publicity that has surrounded the sex abuses cases in the Church:
It seems to me that God often must use rough, very rough instruments to get through to us. Babylonians were used by Him to correct the Israelites, since they were not listening to St. Jeremias. In a similar fashion, I am convinced that we have ignored His laws, especially for the last 40 years. Complaints about “We didn’t understand these problems,” just don’t cut it. If a priest (or layman, since there has been a severe lay crisis in this too, from diocesan psychologists in Catholic Charities to teachers in the Catholic Schools…though the press doesn’t care much about them) does something like this – anything like this, then grab him by the ear and yank him from office. Then take him out back and correct him with a two-by-four. But when there is widespread failure of duty, then God in His compassion has used atheists, district attorneys, newspapers and greedy lawyers to humble us.
The complaint that the newspapers are treating us unfairly is of course true. But it misses the point. No one much gives a hoot about a Lutheran minister doing this sort of crime. The story will be on page sixteen, next to some underwear ads (of course, everything is next to underwear ads in newspapers). But a priest…that’s different. That’s page one stuff, even if there is a suspicious accusation, it’s front page. So I look at it as a back-handed compliment from the devil. He singles us out. And we should be singled out. A priest is an alter Christus. Our standard must be higher. To complain about this is like the Israelites grumbling about the saraph serpents in the Sinai. Yes, they hurt. But if that’s what it takes to go to the Promised Land and be purified of sin, then deal with it.
I don’t mean to say “Bring it on,” like Mr. Bush once stupidly said. But I do mean, we need to stand and take it, and set our jaws like men to accept the correction. In short, God is handling this parlor persecution.
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