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We are all abused when a priest breaks his trust
By Michael Coren
October 16, 2009
Michael Coren
Each time it happens it’s like a wound that we thought had healed suddenly ripping apart and sending a scorching pain though the body. In this case, however, it’s the body of the church. We understand failure. Goodness, we expect it. We’re broken people who sin, which is precisely why we need a saviour, need the sacraments, need the church. But this is not failure. This is something far worse and far more sinister.
Former Antigonish Bishop Raymond Lahey has, as we surely all now know, been charged with the possession of child pornography. He has not yet been convicted but each further revelation proves more damning. It is now claimed that 20 years ago he was seen looking at photographs of aroused teenage boys but that the police and church authorities did nothing. Lahey, media reports say, has admitted to being sexually attracted to men of 20 and 21 but not to those who are younger, which seems disingenuous at best. Also vehemently inconsistent, in that adult homosexual activity may be legal but it is not moral and is directly contrary to Catholic teaching, even if it is the stuff of private fantasy.
Former Antigonish Bishop Raymond Lahey has, as we surely all now know, been charged with the possession of child pornography. He has not yet been convicted but each further revelation proves more damning. It is now claimed that 20 years ago he was seen looking at photographs of aroused teenage boys but that the police and church authorities did nothing. Lahey, media reports say, has admitted to being sexually attracted to men of 20 and 21 but not to those who are younger, which seems disingenuous at best. Also vehemently inconsistent, in that adult homosexual activity may be legal but it is not moral and is directly contrary to Catholic teaching, even if it is the stuff of private fantasy.
Anybody who has explored this subject rather than reacted to a sound-bite report will know that while sexual abuse is, self-evidently, grotesque and appalling, the number of occurrences in the Catholic Church is neither higher nor lower than any other denomination or religion and the same as those in education, sport and any other institution that involves a power dynamic between adult and youth. This is proven in numerous studies by objective and even unsympathetic sociologists and criminologists. Yet if we are to believe the media, abuse is almost exclusively Catholic. And, as a natural consequence, it is argued that abuse is somehow systemic within the church and a result of — achingly predicable — celibacy and an-all male clergy.
Utter nonsense. A failed priest says no more about Catholicism than a failed Canadian says about Canada. Nor should we forget that while it is most tragic for the direct victim, all of us as Catholics are abused when one we have trusted as a priest breaks his word and our hearts and dents the integrity and dignity of the church.
So how do we react? Not with emotion but with compassion and intelligence. On a basic level, if celibacy were an issue, there would be no abuse in Protestant churches. If gender were an issue, we would not have female teachers going to prison for having affairs with child students. More profoundly, Scripture, papacy, magisterium, tradition and logic all object to women as priests. Passing fashion and personal desire is no basis for theology.
As for celibacy, no man is forced to be celibate because no man is forced to be a priest. There are years of formation and preparation and clergy seldom after 15 or 20 years suddenly realize that they cannot live the life they chose. Let’s be realistic here. If they do, they leave and marry; not turn overnight into an abuser. If we want to see modern failure we’d do better to look at divorce rates and men and women who swear fidelity to their spouse but do not live up to their vocation.
In fact some of the people campaigning for married priests and the ordination of women seem more concerned with their own social agenda than with the safeguarding of young people, which is in itself a baleful exploitation. What these same people seldom discuss, because it runs directly contrary to their politics, is the genuine nature of abuser and abused. Fifty years of statistics show that 85 per cent of the latter have been teenage boys. Their tormentors were homosexual men. This is not to suggest that all homosexual men are abusive but merely to state the disturbing but undeniable truth that this is a particular pathology with particular solutions. When the church grasped the nature of the abuse problem it introduced new guidelines concerning the sexuality of men applying to seminaries. And was accused by the very critics blaming the church for doing too little of being, yes, anti-homosexual.
It is, in so many and diverse ways, a dreadfully abusive situation.
Utter nonsense. A failed priest says no more about Catholicism than a failed Canadian says about Canada. Nor should we forget that while it is most tragic for the direct victim, all of us as Catholics are abused when one we have trusted as a priest breaks his word and our hearts and dents the integrity and dignity of the church.
So how do we react? Not with emotion but with compassion and intelligence. On a basic level, if celibacy were an issue, there would be no abuse in Protestant churches. If gender were an issue, we would not have female teachers going to prison for having affairs with child students. More profoundly, Scripture, papacy, magisterium, tradition and logic all object to women as priests. Passing fashion and personal desire is no basis for theology.
As for celibacy, no man is forced to be celibate because no man is forced to be a priest. There are years of formation and preparation and clergy seldom after 15 or 20 years suddenly realize that they cannot live the life they chose. Let’s be realistic here. If they do, they leave and marry; not turn overnight into an abuser. If we want to see modern failure we’d do better to look at divorce rates and men and women who swear fidelity to their spouse but do not live up to their vocation.
In fact some of the people campaigning for married priests and the ordination of women seem more concerned with their own social agenda than with the safeguarding of young people, which is in itself a baleful exploitation. What these same people seldom discuss, because it runs directly contrary to their politics, is the genuine nature of abuser and abused. Fifty years of statistics show that 85 per cent of the latter have been teenage boys. Their tormentors were homosexual men. This is not to suggest that all homosexual men are abusive but merely to state the disturbing but undeniable truth that this is a particular pathology with particular solutions. When the church grasped the nature of the abuse problem it introduced new guidelines concerning the sexuality of men applying to seminaries. And was accused by the very critics blaming the church for doing too little of being, yes, anti-homosexual.
It is, in so many and diverse ways, a dreadfully abusive situation.
Michael Coren