Pope calls for continuous prayer to rid priesthood of paedophilia

Pope calls for continuous prayer to rid priesthood of paedophilia

Richard Owen in Rome

The Times (UK)

January 7, 2008

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article3142511.ece



Pope Benedict XVI has instructed Roman Catholics to pray “in perpetuity” to cleanse the Church of paedophile clergy. All dioceses, parishes, monasteries, convents and seminaries will be expected to organise continuous daily prayers to express penitence and to purify the clergy.



Vatican officials said that every parish or institution should designate a person or group each day to conduct continuous prayers for the Church to rid itself of the scandal of sexual abuse by clergy. Alternatively, churches in the same diocese could share the duty. Prayer would take place in one parish for 24 hours, then move to another.



Vatican watchers said that there was no known precedent for global prayer on a specific issue of this kind. There are about one billion Roman Catholics worldwide.



The instruction was sent to bishops by Cardinal Cláudio Hummes of Brazil, head of the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy. He told L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, that he was acting in the Pope’s name. The Pope wanted Catholics to pray for the “mercy of God for the victims of the grave situations caused by the moral and sexual conduct of a very small part of the clergy”, he said.



Officials said that the prayers were in addition to support for legal action against paedophile priests by their victims and a code adopted two years ago by the Vatican to try to ensure that men “with deep-seated homosexual tendencies” do not enter seminaries to train for the priesthood.



Cardinal Hummes said that the aim was to put a definitive stop to a scandal that had damaged the image of the Church and forced US archdioceses, including Boston and Los Angeles, to pay millions of dollars in compensation to the victims. He said that the scandal was exceptionally serious, although it was probably caused by “no more than 1 per cent” of the 400,000 Catholic priests around the world.



When the paedophile scandal erupted in Boston five years ago, Pope Benedict XVI – or Cardinal Ratzinger as he was then – accused the media of exaggerating the crisis. He later took a tougher stand and was said to have been behind the statement in 2003 by Pope John Paul II to a meeting of American churchmen in which he said: “The abuse which has caused this crisis is rightly considered a crime by society and is also an appalling sin in the eyes of God. People need to know that there is no place in the priesthood and religious life for those who would harm the young.”



When Cardinal Ratzinger stood in for the dying John Paul II at the Good Friday procession of Easter 2005, he stunned the faithful by deploring publicly “how much filth there is in the Church, even among those in the priesthood”. A month later he lifted the legal protection that the Vatican had given to Father Marcial Maciel, the Mexican founder of the Legionaries of Christ, who was accused of sexual abuse of youngsters. Maciel was banned from saying Mass or speaking in public.



However, Cardinal Bernard Law, who was Archbishop of Boston when the scandal broke, was transferred to a post in Rome and remains a respected figure – despite accusations that he did not take strong enough action in dealing with abuse in his diocese.



The Pope, who is preparing an encyclical on the social effects of globalisation, gave a homily at St Peter’s yesterday on the feast of the Epiphany in which he deplored the West’s “search for excess and the superfluous”. He said: “The conflicts for economic supremacy, and the scramble for energy and water resources and raw materials, render difficult the work of all those who strive to construct a more just and united world. We need a greater hope, which allows us to prefer the common good of all to the luxury of few and the poverty of many. Moderation is not only an ascetic rule, but a way of salvation for humanity.”



Church crisis



$660m The amount paid out by the Los Angeles Roman Catholic archdiocese to 500 victims of sexual abuse



$2bn The amount estimated to have been paid out across the US



4,392 The number of priests alleged to have abused children in the US in the past 50 years



10,000 The number of Americans who say that they were abused



100 The number of allegations of abuse made in Ireland between1962 and 2002



21 The number of priests involved



6 of the 21 Irish priests involved died before any allegations were made against them



3,000 The number of allegations of abuse received by the Australian group Broke Rites by 2002



Have your say



As a priest I would say that prayer is always fitting -- however, as a VICTIM OF CLERLGY ABUSE I would say it is not enough. Eight months before ordination I was raped as a deacon by one of the priest in the parish. I reported to my supervisor -- come to find out my supervisor had been diagnosed 13 years earlier (1957) with a psychopathological personality and like playing with mentally ill teenaged girls. He was still active when I was raped (1970). IN the fall of 2001 I had a flashback. Since then I had to follow my conscience and leave ministry. As a priest I could no longer represent bishops who covered up and failed to take responsibility for their own actions. What the Vatican needs to do is remove those bishops who have brought as much (if not more) scandal to the church.



Rev James F Moran, Alexandria, USA/Virginia



Two items:



To Paola of Milan, this has NOTHING to do with homosexuality. There are millions of gay men who have NOTHING to do with minors. The great majority of child abuse is male against female child.



On to the issue.... Out of touch is putting it mildly. Why isn't this Pope calling for the removal of the bishops who kept the abuse hidden and did nothing at the time it was occurring? THAT is something he has full control over and could do something positive to show the Church takes responsibility for the actions and the concealment.



But, I won't hold my breath till it happens. SO much easier to push the responsibility to the parishioners and to God to clean up the Pope's act.



Thomas Denney, Austin, Texas



While I commend daily communication with God, I must remind the leaders of the Catholic Church that communication is a two-way street. It's not just speaking, but listenning as well. If they desire to succeed, they need to listen to what God has said in His Word, the Bible. For example, the idea of "forced celibacy" for priests is considered a doctrine from hell in 1Timothy 4:1-3: "Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to ...doctrines of demons, 2 ..., 3 forbidding to marry,". Besides, the Apostle Paul clearly states that church leaders are to be the "husband of one wife" in 1Timothy 3:2. God has made us sexual beings and being married, having sex within the context of a marital,monogomous relationship between a man and a women is blessed by God, not considered "unspiritual". I believe you'd see a lot less abuse if they followed this truth. For some, Paul does suggest (not command) to remain single in 1Cor. 7



Mike Hill, Aberdeen , Idaho USA



The Pope's appeal is welcome. Divine power will lead to the unmasking of some of the perpetrators, perhaps give some of the victims greater courage to speak out, and enable those who might damage children to withstand their temptations.



Many people assume there is some link between celibacy and paedophilia, but the vast majority of paedophilia assaults are perpetrated by family members: stepfathers, elder brothers, Mum's new boyfriend, favourite uncles etc.



Those churches which have a married clergy - Anglicanism and Methodism - have hardly been immune to child abuse cases, although the media have homed in on the Catholic church to an unprecedented degree. Even Richard Dawkins (The God Delusion) says he thinks the Catholic Church has been unfairly treated by the media in this respect.



The appalling repeat-repeat-repeat cases in some US and Irish dioceses have not really been paralleled to the same extent at all in the UK. But even one case is bad enough...



Bernard O'Callaghan, Chorley, England



Is it too cynical of me to point out that if prayer helped it would not need to be perpetual? No, I don't think it is.



Gatz, Chelmsford, UK



The pope does well to call attention to this issue and to as catholics to address it through serious community prayer.



Allowing priests in the Latin rite to marry wouldn't solve anything. The number of priests who have been involved in paedophilia (less than 1%) is lower than the global overall statistic.



Chris Dela, Cambridge,



As ever the Pope either misses the point or is, much more likely, a hypocrite when his answer to child-abuse in this church is for Catholics to "pray in perpetuality" or for candidates with deep-seated homosexual tendencies to be banned from entering the seminaries (scurrulously suggesting homosexuals and paedophiles are one and the same thing) . The inability to see that allowing men to fulfil their perfectly human sexual needs within a loving relationship with a male or female partner, possibly in the context of marriage and children or a pax is the only way forward highlights what many of us have known for a long time: that ultimately dangerous, irrational dogma still rules.



Paola, Milan, Italy



Praying is talking to yourself. The best solution to this perverted priests problem is fire them and make them get real jobs. An even better solution would be to close down the entire Catholic religion, which after all is nothing but childish nonsense.



BobC, Margate, Florida



It's not about God, it's about people. Jesus did not die for some people, but for all to give hope that each human can have the chance to go to heaven. And the fact that some do not choose God and, what's more, make awful harm to others, means that these people consciously choose hell.



Pope shows that he is really interested in this matter and he is not going to hide away from it.



Monica, Warsaw