An Un-Holy, Holy Week with ¨Locker Room Gossip¨

¨In a truly disgusting display during Holy Week, the Vatican has attempted to cast itself as the “victim” in all of this comparing itself with those who suffered the Holocaust.¨ Father Geoff Farrow


¨Imagine for one moment that the Cover-Up scandal involving Catholic bishops was about superintendents of schools instead of bishops. What if it were grammar school teachers who were pedophiles? Imagine the offending teachers being transferred from one school to another and parents/guardians being given financial settlements with provisions that effectively prevented the victims from making public statements regarding the abuse. Can you imagine what would happen to the Superintendent of a school district who obstructed justice? How long would it take before the local District Attorney pressed criminal charges?

Here is where the analogy fails. Unlike the Public School System, Roman Catholic Diocese are corporations. Corporations enjoy all the legal rights of individuals without the legal responsibilities of individuals. Add to that the social/political clout of the bishops and their extensive financial power and you begin to understand why not one bishop has been prosecuted for obstruction of justice in criminal cases. These are not “white collar” (no pun intended) financial crimes, but crimes in which minors have been sexually abused.

This is why the Cover-Up is actually as bad as the pedophilia itself. The Cover-Up not only is an obstruction of justice in which victims and their families are marginalized and left to fend for themselves. The Cover-Up actually facilitates new case of abuse because bishops/superiors who knew of the abuse transferred the pedophile to new parishes. In several cases, the pedophile was moved across international boarders, thereby undermining any judicial action. All of this has been done to protect not the pedophile priest, but the institution and its reputation and wealth.

In a truly disgusting display during Holy Week, the Vatican has attempted to cast itself as the “victim” in all of this comparing itself with those who suffered the Holocaust. Cardinal Angelo Sodano then dismissed countless legal cases as “rumor.” As if the testimony of thousands of victims and the judicial proceedings of many countries are comparable to coffeehouse and locker room gossip.¨ HERE


Pope Benedict has made worse just about everything that is wrong with the Roman Catholic Church and is directly responsible for engineering the global cover-up of child rape perpetrated by priests, according to this open letter to all Catholic bishops by HANS KÜNG

¨Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, and I were the youngest theologians at the Second Vatican Council from 1962 to 1965. Now we are the oldest and the only ones still fully active. I have always understood my theological work as a service to the Roman Catholic Church. For this reason, on the occasion of the fifth anniversary of the election of Pope Benedict XVI, I am making this appeal to you in an open letter. In doing so, I am motivated by my profound concern for our church, which now finds itself in the worst credibility crisis since the Reformation. Please excuse the form of an open letter; unfortunately, I have no other way of reaching you.¨

CHURCH IN WORST CREDIBILITY CRISIS SINCE THE REFORMATION HERE


¨Call for a council: Just as the achievement of liturgical reform, religious freedom, ecumenism and inter-religious dialogue required an ecumenical council, so now a council is needed to solve the dramatically escalating problems calling for reform. In the century before the Reformation, the Council of Constance decreed that councils should be held every five years. Yet the Roman Curia successfully managed to circumvent this ruling. There is no question that the Curia, fearing a limitation of its power, would do everything in its power to prevent a council coming together in the present situation. Thus it is up to you to push through the calling of a council or at least a representative assembly of bishops.

With the church in deep crisis, this is my appeal to you, venerable bishops: Put to use the episcopal authority that was reaffirmed by the Second Vatican Council. In this urgent situation, the eyes of the world turn to you. Innumerable people have lost their trust in the Catholic Church. Only by openly and honestly reckoning with these problems and resolutely carrying out needed reforms can their trust be regained. With all due respect, I beg you to do your part – together with your fellow bishops as far as possible, but also alone if necessary – in apostolic “fearlessness” (Acts 4:29, 31). Give your faithful signs of hope and encouragement and give our church a perspective for the future.¨ HERE

· Thanks to Father Geoff Farrow, sidebar
· Thanks to HANS KÜNG
· Thanks to The Irish Times
· Thanks to Thalamus Center, sidebar
· Thanks to Flickr Photo Sharing